Drones are increasingly being used for inspections, security operations, logistics, emergency response, and private applications. As a result, air traffic in low-altitude airspace – defined as altitudes of up to 120 meters – is steadily increasing: In Frankfurt alone, more than 1,000 drone operations were registered in April this year1.
At the same time, unauthorised or unidentifiable drone sightings are drawing increasing attention from authorities, infrastructure operators, and security stakeholders. This highlights a challenge that has often been underestimated: In many areas of low-altitude airspace, there is still a lack of transparency regarding who is flying, when, and where.
“As unmanned aviation increasingly uses low-altitude airspace, transparency is becoming a critical safety factor,” says Arndt Schoenemann, Chairman of the Executive Board of DFS Deutsche Flugsicherung GmbH. “Visibility is an essential prerequisite for enabling legitimate use while improving the assessment of risks posed by non-cooperative drones.”
In response to this challenge, Droniq has launched its new TraX app to increase situational awareness integrating live airspace awareness, regulatory guidance and active visibility. What does this actually mean and how does it work?
Global Airspace Radar had the opportunity to speak with Ralph Schepp, COO, Droniq to learn more. Starting with the basics; if you are currently using the free Droniq Maps app you can migrate to the free version of the TraX app retaining flight validation and digital logbook functionality, and also gain something new, the “Fly Now” button. If a user activates this functionality for a visual-line-of-sight (VLOS) flight, it displays active drone flight information for registered users. Think of it as ‘crowd sourced data’.
Something new as you move up to a paid subscription is live airspace awareness. This is enabled by gathering data through multiple sources such as ADS-B, FLARM, Remote ID and direct integration of telemetry information. You could almost think of this a basic drone detection functionality. Today there is a hesitancy amongst many drone pilots to invest in transponder solutions and to have their flight paths shared in a non-confidential manner. TraX Plus could serve as an entry level option to solve this challenge. No transponder is needed and flight information is shared in a confidential manner. The result is cost avoidance and increased conspicuity.
1 Source: Droniq GmbH
