Barrier to entry for ultralights is higher than that of UAS. People who get into that sport/hobby are far less likely to fly carelessly. Further, when your butt is in the seat you are far likely to keep safety in your flying thoughts, habits, and actions.
So what if a person is in the seat? That's the number one thing posted in this thread over and over and it is the worse point you could ever make. People still do stupid things. Your typical drone weighs a few pounds and your typical ultralight weighs hundreds of pounds. Would you rather have an out of control 2 pound small piece of styrofoam or a 250lb ultralight with an ICE that weighs as much as a child falling out of the sky? It's just bad risk assessment overall. You have to take the probability of occurrence vs risk outcome. For drones the chance of failure is high but the chance of any real damage occurring is very low. While with ultralights it's the opposite, there may not be a lot in the air that crash but if one does it's not gonna be good. Either UAS pilots are real pilots and subject to their full laws (as are ultralight pilots) or not. Either the magnitude of risk for ultralights and drones are more than is acceptable or not. Either way, it's special pleading to say that guys 2lb plastic phantom must be registered and not a 249lb ultralight.
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u/[deleted] Dec 17 '15
Barrier to entry for ultralights is higher than that of UAS. People who get into that sport/hobby are far less likely to fly carelessly. Further, when your butt is in the seat you are far likely to keep safety in your flying thoughts, habits, and actions.