District I - 2015/04

The trip to AMA Expo 2015 was a bit unnerving. We flew into a Chicago blizzard and ended up spending most of the day in the airport, or seated in the airplane, while several deice operations were done before it was safe to take off for California. During takeoff, the airplane fishtailed and everyone went silent as it struggled to lift off the snow-covered runway. Fortunately, the rest of the Expo experience went very well.
Show planning efforts were evident with a good mix of exhibitors, products, speaker presentations, and demonstrations. The static display area was well populated with a variety of the latest scratch-built masterpieces from Scale craftsmen. The swap shop included an estate sale and many nice items at bargain prices. Attendees were treated to awe inspiring flights of airplanes, helicopters, and even multirotors doing aerobatics in the demonstration area.
Every isle had vendors showing multirotors in all sizes and configurations for videoing, aerobatics, racing, and FPV flying. All types of accessories were available including radio systems designed specifically for multirotor flying with color HD displays, FPV telemetry, and Google map navigational features. Nearly all the multirotor companies were offering “follow-me” flight mode functions.
The AMA membership meeting was well attended on Saturday and we had a productive council meeting on Sunday. We are asking all AMA members to be aware of the Know Before You Fly program that provides the dos and don’ts of sUAS and model aircraft flying. Program information is available at www.knowbeforeyoufly.org.
I recommend watching the AMA Expo video presentation by Tyler Collin’s on Precision-Hawk’s aerial data collection systems at www.youtube.com/watch?v=LJBpejLYC2c.
The Low Altitude Tracking and Avoidance System that Tyler created may be a solution for FAA to safely track drones and avoid aerial conflicts by utilizing the cellular networks to handle the sharing of location data of all sUAS flying in the national airspace.
Thanks to all who made the 2015 AMA Expo another exceptional event.