Is it worth bringing my spark?  We are leaving saturday for an 8day tour of the south of france, spending the 1st two in Paris.  From what i have read Pairs is pretty much a nofly zone, but after that we will be in Beaune, Avignon, and Nice.  So wondering if it is worth bringing it with, or if I need to get some sort of pre approval for areas I would be allowed to fly in.  I have google searched and find varying answers.  Anyone been to France recently who could help shed some light?

Thanks

Hi,  in France you can't fly in cities, neither (and of course) near airports.  You can find more informations in nofly databases, or on OACI maps.

https://www.geoportail.gouv.fr/d ... ur-drones-de-loisir

Michael Stoute Posted at 2017-11-6 12:31
https://www.geoportail.gouv.fr/donnees/restrictions-pour-drones-de-loisir

haha, bookmarked that earlier since I can't get to that site while at work...Thanks

I bought my spark just for our trip to France and Amsterdam.  I used it in the Normandy region for some cool shots, I wasn't able to fly when we were in Paris and Amsterdam unfortunately but I was able to get out of Amsterdam to the famous windmills at Zaans Schans

Hi, Beaune and Avignon should be ok, Nice (as most of the Côte d'Azur) is NFZ for no objective reasons (apart from near airport of course!). Apparently the "beautiful people" with their villas there have a good lobby to have achieved this. But once you go to the most beautiful countryside away from the coastline you are free again. Definitely worth taking your Spark there and to fly and film/photograph as much as you can! Hopefully weather will be in favour too. Down there it still can be very nice even this late in the year.

Wachtberger Posted at 2017-11-6 13:04
Hi, Beaune and Avignon should be ok, Nice (as most of the Côte d'Azur) is NFZ for no objective reasons (apart from near airport of course!). Apparently the "beautiful people" with their villas there have a good lobby to have achieved this. But once you go to the most beautiful countryside away from the coastline you are free again. Definitely worth taking your Spark there and to fly and film/photograph as much as you can! Hopefully weather will be in favour too. Down there it still can be very nice even this late in the year.

Thanks for the info!  Will be with a tour group, so hopefully some of the stops along the way are "drone friendly".

I will for sure recommend you to take Spark with you, you just have to follow the regulation and you will be fine, you can fly almost everywhere outside the cities and away from airports of course, here in Europe and we have veruy beautiful places to be filmed...;-)

I see the entire Atlantic coast is also NFZ!!??
The red spots are clear enough. But what do the pinks and yellows mean?

djiuser_Kf4iPA3 Posted at 2017-11-6 14:31
I see the entire Atlantic coast is also NFZ!!??
The red spots are clear enough. But what do the pinks and yellows mean?

The website link posted here above is not very helpful and does not reflect the true situation. Everyone travelling to France should search for better information or find a forum member from France here who has first hand information available.

I would recommend you check the NFZ and relevant regulation in the following link: http://www.dji.com/flysafe?site=brandsite&from=footer.

Wachtberger Posted at 2017-11-6 15:10
The website link posted here above is not very helpful and does not reflect the true situation. Everyone travelling to France should search for better information or find a forum member from France here who has first hand information available.

The linked website is in gouv.fr domain which I guess is official French government domain. What would you suggest to better reflect 'true' situation and which information you claim are false?

djiuser_Kf4iPA3 Posted at 2017-11-6 14:31
I see the entire Atlantic coast is also NFZ!!??
The red spots are clear enough. But what do the pinks and yellows mean?

If you open the legend on the right hand side you will see what different colors mean. Pink mean max altitude 30m, different shades of yellow are max altitudes 50/60/100m.

One more comment: Atlantic coast is a Schengen border. That's the reason why it is NFZ. For example east border of Poland (Schengen border too) is another NFZ.

Michael Stoute Posted at 2017-11-6 12:31
https://www.geoportail.gouv.fr/donnees/restrictions-pour-drones-de-loisir

This is a very intresting map, obviously produced by civil servants (of which we have a surfeit) sat at their desks, remote from the area. Every Town Hall has an exclusion zone which may sound reaonable, but in many cases these are just a couple of rooms in a house used one afternoon a week.

There are large exclusion zones around many airstrips which again sound reasonable. One I know of is simply a level piece of grass where a farmer used a microlight aircraft. He stopped flying it years ago but presumably he has some sort of permission recorded somewhere hence the total ban on flying anywhere near there.

I live in an area SW of Toulouse where they flight test the Airbus. They fly very low (  but not less than the max drone height of 150 metres   )and I expected some restriction but we have nothing in place here.

Flightradar is a good app which shows the activity of helicopters and gliders operating in your area. EDF in particular operate helicopters in unexpected places to inspect power lines and they fly VERY low.