BVLOS Safety Assurance: What Standard 922 Means for Drone Manufacturers Under Transport Canada’s New BVLOS and Medium Drone Rules
For drone manufacturers looking to sell under the Advanced Category of drone operations in Canada, declaring your drone safe for controlled airspace, near people, and over people was simple. The process? Simply go to the declaration page, fill out a few lines, and you are added to the list.
However, as mentioned in the previous article, this process has been problematic for end users and manufacturers.
For end users, they assume that Transport Canada – Transports Canada has looked at the paperwork in advance. In reality, it is a self-declaration process whereby “you do not need to submit the results of the AC 922-001 Remotely Piloted Aircraft Systems Safety Assurance verification tests along with your declaration of RPAS Safety Assurance. However, you may be asked to produce the results of verification tests at a later date. Failure to produce the results of verification tests when requested may impact the declaration status of your RPAS.”
This has been problematic for end users as they’ve now experienced life when Transport Canada completes an audit and removes the expensive drone you just bought from the list. For example, in 2024, Transport Canada released their oversight report results.