Unmanned Systems Editing and Proofreading Services

A pilot of a manned aircraft may report that "a drone" passed close to the wingtip during approach, that it was close and fast, and that it was gone before anyone could react. Investigators cannot determine the altitude, the actual separation or which of several hundred licensed drone operators within a ten-mile radius might have been flying at the time, because "close" and "fast" are the impressions of someone traveling at 140 knots who saw an object for less than a second, and the report contains nothing that narrows the search.

The documents we edit for Unmanned Systems

We edit the documents drone operators, manufacturers and regulators produce in connection with incidents and near-misses: reports of unmanned aircraft incidents and near-misses, documentation of lost-link and contingency procedures, operator logs and flight records, applications for airspace authorizations and waivers, manufacturer safety bulletins and firmware update notices, and correspondence following a reported sighting or complaint. Our editors work on reports describing an encounter that lasted less than a second.

What the editing involves

Detail that allows reconstruction is what turns a drone incident report from an anecdote into something that can be investigated, and the characteristic failure is a report built entirely from impressions (close, fast, large) with nothing that can be checked against records. A near-miss report without an altitude, time or location precise enough to search cannot be matched to an operator, confirmed against a flight log or used to identify a pattern. We revise these reports so that the time is recorded to the minute where possible and the location as a specific position or as a distance and bearing from a known point, since "near the airport" may describe a search area of many square miles, whereas a specific position narrows it to something that can be cross-referenced. Altitude is estimated with a stated method, relative to the observer's own known altitude or to a landmark of known height, rather than given as a bare figure, because an unsupported estimate cannot be weighed against a conflicting account. The description separates what was directly observed from what was assumed, given that "it looked like a small quadcopter" and "it was definitely operating illegally" are very different kinds of claim. The operator's own logs are checked against the reported time and location before an operator is ruled in or out, rather than the operator being accepted or dismissed on reputation or on the apparent plausibility of the report. A lost-link or contingency procedure is described in terms of the specific action taken and the time required to execute it, since "the aircraft returned to home safely" does not show whether the contingency worked promptly or only narrowly in time. Recurring incidents in the same location or time window are tracked as a pattern, given that separate reports of drones near the same approach path collectively indicate an airspace problem rather than several unrelated events. Reports written in this way can be acted upon.

Confidentiality and the limits of our role

All material sent to us is treated in confidence, including flight records, incident data and operator information. We are editors, not drone operators, air safety investigators or regulators, and we offer no opinion on airspace violations, safety or liability. Our role is to ensure that each report contains enough information to be investigated.