He did mention there was no real instrument to get a sUAV waiver to fly in TFR, at least in this region.
This ^^^^^^^^
Been there, read that, TFR is obviously missing. But in the end, our little birds are still considered aircraft by the FAA. Read my next comment.
TFR isn't missing because it's not as simple as getting a waiver. The WAIVER comes from the entity (ATC/FAA) who are in charge of Airspace and NAS safety and such. A TFR can be "established" from many other entities (
Forest service, NFL, NASCAR, DHS, ....) so this is why there is not a portal or "Easy Button" to be able to fly in a TFR. Way too many variables to have an Easy Button.
While it's not easy it CAN be done. I've seen several UAS operations jump through the hoops and get to fly within a TFR for things like an Airshow and such. It can be done but that doesn't mean the agency who requested the TFR is going to allow any UAS operations. They can deny you and if they do you really have no recourse other than to not fly if they deny.
Most published data on TFR's will give definite boundries, dates and times and altitude restrictions. In addition, they will list the controlling agency with contact name and phone. You must contact them to initiate the waver process or get permission.
See the portion in RED above ^^^^^^
To get permission to fly within a TFR you go to the Controlling Agency/Company/Department and initiate the request through them. They are the ones who can "Allow" you to operate within their TFR. You have to go to the source of the TFR request in the first place and they will tell you what they require to allow you to operate within their TFR.
For instance: We fly Search & Rescue and the local Incident Management Team (IMT) here locally for the county/region. Last year we had a wild fire break out in our area and when the Forest Service came on scene they requested and had the FAA establish a TFR for the area affected. Any entity/person not directly working with the Forest Service could not fly in the TFR without explicit approval via the Forest Service. Our IMT was assigned to this incident and as such we were allowed to fly within the TFR (
although DJI did not make it easy). Others in the area who desired to fly over the incident were not allowed and if they had ignored it they could have faced large fines and penalties. This included news agencies, hobbyists, and other commercial UAS operations. We didn't go to the FAA we went to the Incident Commander. We presented our credentials, our required operations (
to justify the flight), and then presented our manuals as such for review. It took about 2 hours (
it helped we were with a Govt agency) and from that point on we just had to coordinate with the Incident Commander and the Air Boss. They mandated when, where, how far/high we could fly very precisely.
The other "operations" you mentioned that fly within the TFR jump through all the same hoops we have to in order to fly within a TFR. I imagine some are very simple and require nothing more than some signatures etc while others can take months to prepare, review, revise, and finally get approved/denied. One difference (I think) is that if there is a TFR in place and there is IFR traffic that is actively being controlled by ATC they "can" be approved fairly easily to traverse the TFR but within very strict conditions. I just vaguely remember reading something about this in a publication or something recently and it does not pertain to UAS or anything we might do with our UAS what so ever.
