When was the last time you buckled yourself into the cockpit of your plane, tuned in the ATIS, prepared to taxi and thought, "I wonder if I'm going to hit a drone when I take off today?" The answer is probably never, and that may be appropriate for 2018. The chance of a collision with a drone today is probably less than being hit by a bus as you cross the street or winning Powerball, or both of those things happening at the same instant. The problem is that the odds are going to get higher for drone/aircraft collisions, as the numbers and types of aircraft occupying our airspace are expected to increase dramatically soon, with most of that increase expected to be due to drones. Drones are here to stay. Not only are they here to stay, but it may surprise some who have not been following this topic closely to learn that the number of registered drones already far surpasses the number of registered GA, air taxi and commercial aircraft combined, and that gap is expected to grow dramatically in the coming decade. For example, based on FAA statistics, in 2017 the total number of registered aircraft in the general aviation fleet and air taxi fleet was 213,050 with an additional 7,141 commercial aircraft. Based on the FAA Aerospace Forecast Fiscal Year 2018-2038, numbers for general aviation, aircraft and air taxis are expected to hold steady for the next two decades while the number of aircraft in the U.S. commercial fleet is forecast to increase to 8,290.
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