Hi fellow pilots

Good day, so the mavic will be my first drone. Since I was a child I always wanted to have a flying RC and this one looks to be the perfect for me.
Now, the point here is that I have been trying to get ready to do the maiden flight of my Mavic as soon as it arrives, however I am still a bit confused on where can I actually fly my drone.

The guidelines that I have read look ambiguos and or common sense. But I am wondering what are the actual rules that the people follow when flying their drones in the city.

I would like to practice with my drone in a park when there is not many people, but is that acceptable? I would love to fly it following the shore of many of our beautiful beaches here in Sydney, but based on what I read you cannot flying over the beach (which make sense if there is people so you dont hurt them) but what about flying it when there is no people? ie, early in the morning.

I dont know I have so many questions, perhaps some Aussie fellow pilots can enlighten me  as I want to enjoy flying safely and legally.

Thanks!

Hi mate.  Rules are basically not within 5.5 kms of an aerodrome there is an app called safe to fly  that uses your gps to let you know if your cool.

As for beaches I also go early in the morning to avoid people. Also with parks.

You also need to limit it to 400ft.

I agree the rules are pretty vague here but honestly when in Australia did a govt make things easy?

Maaaaaaaaate
Things were looking good here in aus but a bloke called Nick Zenifon has decided to harden up the rules! God love him! doesn't he realise there are idiots in all of mankind wether  it be drones or guns or motor vehicles!
Regulations dont get rid of fools.
I was in sydney last month and noticed the signs in National Parks "No Drones".   But there is plenty of space in Oz to fly, we just have to drive out a bit to do it!

The laws were revised in September

https://www.rpastraining.com.au/ ... ne-legal-or-illegal

Standard RPA operating conditions means that the RPA must be operated:

within visual line of sight
below 400 ft AGL
during the day
more than 30 m away from anyone who is not directly associated with the operation (people being filmed are not considered to be directly associated with the RPA’s operation)
It may NOT be operated:

over a populous area
within 3 nautical miles of the movement area of a controlled aerodrome
in a prohibited area
in a restricted area that is classified as RA3
in a restricted area that is classified as RA2 or RA1 otherwise than in accordance with regulation 101.065
over an area where a fire, police or other public safety or emergency operation is being conducted without the approval of a person in charge of the operation

My advice would be to go and find an empty field first and learn to fly with confidence before you try a public park, lots of accidents seem to happen right of the bat,it's becoming a bit of a cliche here to advise newbies to read the manual a couple of times before you set out to fly just saying, it was the right advice for me when I started.
Good luck with your Mavic, if it's as good as previous drones from dji you will have a ball..

I think you can get answers by looking at you local government rules.

Okay this is ridiculous no wonder there is confusion. I live in North Sydney and fly inspires everyday both commercially and for a hobby if you want to come to North Sydney / lower north shore there are a lot of great parks there. I'm close with council and have no enemies ( you will find that 999 people out of every thousand North Sydney people are amazing interesting and great attitude who are usually quite interested, or more interested in my labrador.  I Would be happy to run you through any maiden flights. Legislation constantly changes even last week a 2 kg law still trumps technically a helicopter and aerodrome perimeter and the harbour so common sense should be number one law and respect  even if interpretation can very.  Sheer volume is what CASA is trial and erroring.  They do a damn good job and they are swamped .  The new director of Safety  / head of CASA Mark Skidmore's  Best friend goes to my park and is a wealth of information, and is lovely!
I have flown at Rushcutters bay park avoiding being above the harbour fore shores. Rangers approach, fascinated and I never get to have much airtime  because they just want to talk ! Ironic.  I prefer when it's not busy.  And I think a deserted oval would be perfect to learn how to fly a flying blender
People or dogs or human interaction will be your best learning curve the trees don't change much.
A great flight controller for your first drone assuming it is almost identical to the inspire Ncor  flight controller which was my first drone.  It's very easy. first it is confidence because your  Best contribution to the law is to know the drone back to front.
Minmim81 is the before the ampersand to my gmail account Unless minmim81@gmail.com is not blocked on a forum. Most days the parks are deserted and when we both get our mavics sometime next year when they are actually released the offer is there

These ever-changing new drone laws are trying to modify / bandaid the initial 1998 flight act which may yet see my OC and pilots license obsolete for light RPAs

One of the funniest drone experiences I had there was when I was flying and another guy rocks up with a nice silver case obviously wanting to fly  something  so out of the four empty ovals, he HAD to come stand right next to me and fly.  We proceeded to not talk for ages. But fly. Bit weird, but nice (I  Think he was very very shy or something going on there)... lol

Tim

Minmim81 Posted at 2016-10-11 14:09
Okay this is ridiculous no wonder there is confusion. I live in North Sydney and fly inspires every ...

First of all thanks a lot for the glad welcome and Invitation! I live in North Sydney area and recon that i Have been scouting some parks that might be suitable for my maiden flights!   What is very confusing on the rules is that they state that you cannot get closer to 30 meters of any thing well, that itself is a challenge I do understand that the flying blender can be dangerous!! never flown anything in my life!  

i will be sending you an email to your account and hopefully I can learn ( and I promise to dont bore with more talk and talk  instead we fly haha )

Funny story about 3 years ago I bought a  Trex 450 Pro along with the huge control, well. They assembled in the store and showed me that it could fly. They handed it over to me ... mate, that thing was scary.  It lived in my shelf. Didnt even flew it once, it was waaaay to scary. Later I learn that that was an acrobatic RC Heli imagine that I am a complete noob and they gave me 3D capable flyer!

There is an app from casa website that lets you know straight away if you can or cant fly. If you re on orange zone you can only fly max 45 mtr altitude providing you follow the guidelines.

Just wanna add
Basically you can fly anywhere you want as long as it is not on the red zone

You can even fly on melbourne CBD providing you re at least 30 mtr from other people (very hard as cbd is always busy with people but there is a spot at dockland where it is very quiet), in a daylight and can keep the drone at sight at all times. I flew my mavic at victoria harbor, flew on top of the water there, took a pic and video of bolte bridge. Basically as long as it is safe and common sense prevails

Over popolous does not mean when you see building, over populous means when you see. A crowd of people. You can fly where there re building but only when you are sure your drone is safe and the building wont interfere with gps signal. Flying in between high rise building is strictly a no no, as it can obstruct gps signal.

In a quiet park anywhere is permittable as long as again it is not on red zone. When you fly your drone on a busy place thats where you get trouble and fine.

I called casa office and they confirmed this

Heres the link to download app from casa
https://www.casa.gov.au/droneapp