The City of Cape Town will not stop using drones to fight crime following the release of new regulations by the Civil Aviation Association, according to a report.
The regulations, which will come into effect in July, restrict drone flights over crime scenes, nuclear plants or police stations according to the Cape Argus.
They also restrict the height a drone may fly (not over 121.92 metres) and restricts them from flying withing 10km of an aerodrome.
Every drone user will also have to get a letter of approval, valid for one year, to fly one. They must be over 18 to apply, must provide a medical certificate and need to pass a competency test which includes proficiency in radiotelephony and English, Dominic Skelton reported for The Times.
The cost of licensing will be similar to getting a private pilot's licence, about R150,000.
Flying a drone illegally could land you behind bars for 10 years, a fine of R50,000 or both.
“As a first bite, these regulations err on the side of caution. It will curtail the non-policing use of drones dramatically,” JP Smith, mayoral committee member for Safety and Security told the Cape Argus.
However he also said that this wouldn't stop the city's use of the devices.
“All of these provisions are malleable in terms of the operations manual. Nothing that we do is curtailed in any way (by these regulations),” Smith said.
According to My Broadband Cape Town recently tested a drone in the field during a drug bust in the Cape Flats.
When the police arrived at the suspect's house, a drone with an infrared camera was launched to watch the operation from above, giving the cops an eye in the sky to catch any suspects who fled, hid or threw their weapons or drugs away.
“We saw drug dealers fleeing down passages and into homes, we saw where one tossed his package of heroin and we saw a gangster crawl across a roof and drop into a neighbouring property. We were able to arrest him, much to his surprise, when he emerged a few houses down,” Smith said.
The video below details exactly how the drone system works.
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