Part 101 of CASR Unmanned aircraft and rockets

Rule status

Part 101 of the Civil Aviation Safety Regulations (CASR) consolidates the rules for all unmanned aeronautical activities into one body of legislation.

It sets out the rules for the use of:

  • unmanned tethered balloons and kites
  • unmanned free balloons
  • unmanned rockets
  • remotely piloted aircraft (RPA) or drones
  • model aircraft
  • firework displays.

Who it affects

Part 101 of CASR affects:

  • remotely piloted aircraft owners and operators
  • model aircraft owners and operators.

It also affects organisations and people involved in:

  • unmanned balloons (including use of a large number of party balloons) and rocket operations
  • firework displays
  • research and development
  • law enforcement
  • surveillance
  • weather research
  • users of airborne telecommunications systems.

Legislative instruments

Legislative instruments include exemptions to regulatory requirements in aviation regulations or a Manual of Standards.

Exemptions may apply to a broad range of people.

Instruments related to this part will display in this space or you can view our list of legislative instruments.

11 legislative instruments available

Approval – operation of RPA at night
Commences:
CASA 01/17

Non-legislative instruments

Non-legislative instruments apply to a particular person. Some exemptions to regulatory requirements in aviation regulations or a Manual of Standards may be listed here.

Non-legislative instruments related to this part will display in this space or you can view our list of non-legislative instruments.

12 non-legislative instruments available

Guidance material

Advisory material provides advice and guidance to explain particular regulatory requirements of a CASR Part. Guidance material relating to this part will appear in this space or you can view all our guidance material.

6 guidance material available

Updated:

AC 101-03 provides guidance on safely and lawfully flying model aircraft and drones recreationally or for education, training or research purposes in schools and higher education providers.

Advisory Circular Version: 2.0
Updated:

Advisory Circular AC 101-05 only contains the functions and duties of a remotely piloted aircraft (RPA) maintenance controller.

Advisory Circular Version: 1.1
Updated:

AC 101-01 describes the categorisation of RPA and general requirements for use of RPAS. It also provides guidance to operators and crew on the safe and legal operation of RPA in all classes of airspace.

Advisory Circular Version: 6.0
Updated:

The RPAS beyond visual line of sight (BVLOS) outside of controlled airspace (OCTA) examination - Aeronautical Knowledge Standards will assist training organisations to develop training material related to the RPAS BVLOS OCTA - Aeronautical Knowledge Standards exam.

Exam syllabus Version: 1.0
Updated:

This TMI specifies the CASA policy to support processing applications for the approval of RPA operations over or near people (OONP) for the purposes of regulation 101.245 and 101.280 of CASR.

Temporary management instruction Version: 1.1
Updated:

This TMI provides alternate methods to be used by industry for SORA version 2.0 (SORA 2.0) based applications, and by CASA for application assessment, under Part 101 of CASR. This includes an alternate method to calculate the final ground risk class through an updated intrinsic ground risk class (iGRC) table, amendment to the ground risk mitigations, and an optimal grid resolution table.

Temporary management instruction Version: 1.0
Last updated date
Updated:
Online version available at: https://www.casa.gov.au//rules/regulatory-framework/casr/part-101-casr-unmanned-aircraft-and-rockets
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