Irish Aviation Authority awards ASL Future Flight a Light UAS Aircraft Systems Operator Certificate for cargo

ASL Air­lines Ire­land sub­sidiary ASL Future Flight has been award­ed a Light UAS Air­craft Sys­tems Oper­a­tor Cer­tifi­cate (LUC) by the Irish Avi­a­tion Author­i­ty, an option­al oper­a­tional cer­tifi­cate which guar­an­tees some priv­i­leges to start com­mer­cial drone oper­a­tions with­out an oper­a­tional autho­ri­sa­tion from the IAA, such as the deliv­ery of light car­go over a short range.

It will be used by ASL Future Flight to train on drone oper­a­tions before mov­ing on to heav­ier and longer-range oper­a­tions. ASL Air­lines Ire­land (ASLI) is one of sev­en air­lines in the ASL Avi­a­tion Hold­ings group oper­at­ing car­go flights glob­al­ly for the express par­cel and e‑commerce mar­kets.

ASLI has a fleet of 40 air­craft and cus­tomers include FedEx, DHL and Ama­zon. ASL Future Flight’s LUC allows for oper­a­tions under PDRA-S01, which is a Pre-defined Risk Assess­ment sce­nario pub­lished by the Euro­pean Union Avi­a­tion Safe­ty Agency (EASA) and adopt­ed by the IAA.

It autho­ris­es flights by a drone less than three metres in diam­e­ter with a max­i­mum take-off weight of 25 kg, includ­ing short-range car­go oper­a­tions which would typ­i­cal­ly allow the deliv­ery of small pack­ages up to about 5 kg.

“Car­go will play a key role in the devel­op­ment of new flight tech­nolo­gies,” said ASL Air­lines Ire­land man­ag­ing direc­tor John Rawl. “This LUC shows ASL’s com­mit­ment to be ready as unmanned air­craft become larg­er and capa­ble of oper­at­ing over wider net­works deliv­er­ing car­go up to 500 kg or more.”

UAS Man­ag­er for the IAA, Enda Walsh added: “ASL Future Flight is only the third oper­a­tor to obtain a Light UAS Oper­a­tor Cer­tifi­cate from the IAA, a reflec­tion of ASL’s strong organ­i­sa­tion­al struc­ture, safe­ty man­age­ment sys­tem and staff com­pe­ten­cies.”

Avtrain worked with ASL Future Flight to devel­op the man­u­al suite for the LUC, includ­ing the oper­a­tions man­u­al. “The future of flight is here and to see such a sig­nif­i­cant play­er as ASL Air­lines being award­ed a LUC is a huge step­ping stone to full scale eVTOL oper­a­tions” said Avtrain CEO, Julie Gar­land.

ASL is explor­ing new flight tech­nolo­gies through ASL Car­go­V­i­sion, a forum of fif­teen com­pa­nies involved in unmanned flight, large drone or unmanned air­craft and sus­tain­able flight using hybrid elec­tric and hydro­gen fuels.

Estab­lished in 1972, ASL Air­lines Ire­land is one of four ASL Avi­a­tion Hold­ings air­lines in Europe, which oper­ates a fleet of wide- and nar­row-body freighter air­craft through­out Europe, North Amer­i­ca and the Mid­dle East.