Unmanned Traffic Management Service Providers (UTMSP)
Part of: Prelims and GS III – Aviation
Context The Ministry of Civil Aviation has notified a traffic management policy framework for drones, which envisages private, third-party service providers for ensuring safe operations.
Key takeaways
Major role: Under the framework, these Unmanned Traffic Management Service Providers (UTMSP) will extend automated, algorithm-driven software services instead of voice communication as in the traditional Air Traffic Management (ATM) systems.
Responsibility: They will be responsible for segregating and separating a drone from other drones and manned aircraft in the airspace below 1,000 feet in the country.
Supplementary Service Providers (SSPs): The traffic management providers will be assisted by Supplementary Service Providers (SSPs), who will maintain data about terrain, weather, location of manned aircraft and provide services such as insurance, data analytics and drone fleet management.
Law enforcement and security agencies will also have access to some information in the UTM ecosystem on a need-to-know basis.
Levy of Service fee allowed
The policy also allows UTMSPs to levy a service fee on users, a small portion of which will also be shared with the Airports Authority of India.
In order to implement this policy, the government is likely to carry out UTM-based experiments in the country and then float a request for proposal for onboarding UTMSPs.
Following which an evaluation process will be undertaken and successful participants will be awarded regions for establishment of UTM services.
