Pre deployment survey or pre- site survey
This is a form that is designed by you, with guidance from the NQE and details the location of where there is a request to fly. The full location map coordinates and details the contact details for emergency such as the air traffic control. This is where the NOTAM’s are recorded.
NOTAM this is Notice to airmen and on your ground school the training company will go into greater detail. This informs you of hazards, planned military exercises and no fly zones. NOTAM’s can change daily and informs pilots of what is happening in airspace above the UK.
If you have been working in TV production for a while it is very similar to a call sheet. Details of all emergency numbers, local police, the address and contact details of the nearest accident and emergency. It detail maps of the local area, diagrams of the site and my potential flight plan once on site.
Onsite survey form
This is when you get to see what the actual site looks like, as you can only obtain so much info from internet and maps. This is also when you assessing the other potential risks that are present when you get to the location such as telegraph poles. Or site restrictions. So together these forms are your plan, and your risk assessment of the drone flights. Still a TV production company may require a separate risk assessment writing.
These I submitted to my flight instructor before flight school. Resource group ask you to write these forms yourself. It may be other training companies give you these forms as templates.
Advice would be to plan as many mock jobs in areas that you don’t know, using all the tools, websites and maps that the training company show you at ground school. Then when you get to the flight assessment part of this process you will have lots of practice and this will make you feel more confident.
Next up the flight assessment
The Drone Lass 