Drone is a fascinating, but new and complex invention. Uses of these aircrafts are discovered every day, whether it is for delivery, transportation, military actions, surveillance, etc.. In the first place, we are aware of all the opportunities that drone can offer us. The Telegraph has stated this year that Drones have the potential to transform the world for the better. In the UK, the emergency services have started to use them to help people in danger, while the defense industry is exploring how drones can improve security. But, in October 2017, the Sun published an article entitled More UK drones are flying dangerously close to aeroplanes than ever – with a fifth of the 81 incidents this year risking serious collision. In the same month, the New-York Times reported an accident in an article entitled After Drone Hits Plane in Canada, New Fears About Air Safety. November, the NZ Herald reported another accident in Drone interferes with landing of incoming plane at Auckland Airport. Basically, accidents of drone are reported all over the planet while innovation around it has been continuing. Last September, the first flying drone taxi was tested in Dubai and the test was successful. We can soon imagine it put in use as an app service, like an “Uber-drone” service. But what about the regulation of such businesses? Are we facing a lack of regulation for the use of drones? What will be the future of such disrupting services?

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What we strive for?

To prevent the danger resulted from the use of drones, we decided to create Eurodrone. Our goal is to appoint a commission that would investigate the issues s related to drone regulation, such as the tension between societal concerns about privacy and security and the potential economic benefit of drones for business growth. While there are already advisory bodies at the EU level investigating the issue, we believe efforts should be focused more closely on bringing together the digital, societal and security dimensions. Our aim is thus to complement EU’s efforts in creating a regulatory framework for drones and involve citizens in its implementation. This proposal is to be submitted to the European Parliament, the ultimate goal of our project consisting of a treaty to be voted by all EU countries then incorporated in their own legal systems.

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What already exist in EU?

The process of the regulation of drone started in France in 2012. The French Transport Code defines drones as "any aircraft capable of rising or circulating in the air" (Article L. 6100-1). It was not until 2016 that the Article L. 6214-2 of Transportation Code started to oblige the user of civilian drone to receive a special training to manage their drones. Finally, since January 2017, drone users in France will be liable if they use drones in case of “wrongfully flying over restricted areas”.

Italy followed France in 2013, the Italian Body for Civil Aviation established a distinction between aircrafts on the basis of the activities they carried out. (i) Aircraft systems with remote pilotage that are used for specialized operations or in scientific activities, experimentation, and research and (ii) air models used only in activities for leisure or competition purposes.

Germany also started the regulation of drones early this year. In addition to general aviation rules, pilots must respect no-fly zones that include sensitive areas ranging from airports via military and industrial facilities, to federal highways.

In United Kingdom, the government launched a public consultation in December 2016, for the safe use of drone in the country. They finally issued their response in July 2017.The current law referred The Civil Aviation Authority ("CAA") is responsible for supervising compliance with the Air Navigation Order 2016 ("ANO"), which is the principal legislation governing the use of drones. The ANO regulates the use of drones by reference to their use, their weight, and whether or not they have surveillance capability.

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Why at the european level?

The European aviation safety agency (EASA) proposed a prototype regulation in October 2016. It was written on its website that the proposal provides a framework to safely operate drones while allowing this industry to remain agile, to innovate and continue to grow. The risk posed to people on the ground and to other aircraft as well as privacy, security and data protection issues created by such drones are also taken into account. From its expression, we find that its main focus is on the development of the drone industry. Accidents of drones being reported continuously, we wonder what has really been done by the European parliament? How comes it possible that we still have the same issues one year after another? Are we waiting for more and more accident to occur? Therefore, we come out with a charter mainly focusing on the safe use of drones to make up the missing part of regulations in this field in Europe.

Besides, we want to foster an international cooperation for an efficient and safe use of this technology. As intergovernmental interests are difficult to balance, we decide to target the European level. In this way, we can have a stronger voice on this issue because the EU is already a governmental organization, and once the charter is ratified by the European parliament, all its member states may apply it into their legal system.

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How to make our voice be heard?

We are also conscious of how ideas can be spread out broadly: nowadays, all ideas have to be marketed in order to get propagated. We chose to take advantage of this law and favor a nice format to make our project easily reach more people and try to get a chance to “get viral”.

We will make full use of the digital to help us. First of all, we have created a website where we put articles and a video to illustrate our project. Then we have also created social networks pages for EURODRONE where our project can get much more attention by recommendations, especially from the young generation. By circulation in the social network, we want to raise awareness of European citizens on the safe use of drones and gain support for our charter to be ratified by the European parliament.