Public access to the drone industry has seen the unmanned aerial vehicles taking off across the globe, be it for leisure or industry purposes. Reaching speeds of up to 30 miles per hour and staying airborne for up to twenty minutes there’s a big scope for their use and the help they can lend.

Whether you did or didn’t purchase your model to assist you with search attempts or check your crops are growing nicely without disturbance… there are a few rules that you need to abide by. We’ll try and keep it brief and to the point but either way, you’re going to need to hear it.

These lightweight devices are becoming increasingly sophisticated and less expensive. So long as the drone weighs under 20kg you don’t need to worry about registering it and you can fly it straight out of the box. If, however it does weigh over 20kg then you’ll need to register it with the CAA – despite the House of Lords EU Committee calling for all civilian drones to be registered due to lack of aviation rules surrounding the devices that are already beginning to cloud the skies.

Not yet legally allowed to be used for commercial purposes these devices are allowed to fly to heights of up to 400 feet, carrying their high-definition or 4K cameras that feed a live stream of footage straight back to your smartphone screen. The smartphone is also used as a controller to fly the drone, meaning you save on space and weight s who doesn’t take their phone with them everywhere these days anyway?

You must ensure that the drone whether it be a Parrot, DJI or mini version is kept at least 50metres away from people and at thievery least, 150 meters away from congested areas – most importantly airports! A quick flick through a newspaper and you’re guaranteed to stumbled across a story of an unmanned aerial vehicle having near miss incident or colliding with a commercial flight. Luckily they’re a considerable amount smaller so the only damaged caused is to the drone!

Given their ability to capture footage never before imaginable to the man stood with two feet on the ground and to reach considerable heights, the restriction and slight limitations on use at the moment are easy to understand. So keep your drone within sight and don’t fly too close to strangers! Enjoy.