The Kananaskis Enchancment District, or Kananaskis for brief, is located within the Rockies of Alberta, Canada. Outdoors of this municipality, within the neighborhood, you’ll additionally discover Kananaskis Nation and Kananaskis Village.
Are you able to fly a drone wherever in Kananaskis?
You may’t fly a drone in most of Kananaskis as a result of Kananaskis Nation consists of an assortment of provincial park that prohibit UAVs for leisure use. Business pilots would require a allow.
For those who’re a bit of confused, we’ll clarify all the pieces forward, so be sure you preserve studying! There’s a number of wonderful data to come back.
Are you able to fly a drone in Kananaskis Nation?
Alberta contains a handful of enchancment districts, which regardless of the title, are normally municipal authorities and generally enterprise districts.
The Kananaskis Enchancment District within the Alberta Rockies is on the identical border as Kananaskis Nation, a multi-use space close to the Canadian Rockies that options Crown land, ecological reserves, wildland provincial parks, provincial leisure areas, and provincial parks.
To make issues extra complicated, the legal guidelines range from one place to a different in Kananaskis Nation.
As a drone pilot, right here’s what you could know. You can’t fly recreationally in any provincial parks in Alberta, together with these in Kananaskis.
Alberta Parks[1] has a Use of Unmanned Aerial Automobiles coverage in place. Within the Leisure Use of UAVs in Alberta Parks part, the rule reads:
“The leisure use of a UAV is not allowed in websites within the provincial parks system.”
The Business Use of UAVs in Alberta Parks part explains that, presently, Alberta Parks doesn’t allow business pilots to make use of a drone for supervised filming.
Nonetheless, in the event that they did, you’d must pay a supervised filming payment of $110 CAD an hour to make use of your drone in any of the provincial parks.
Additional, you’d want both a Particular Flight Operations Certificates or an Superior Pilots License, with no primary licenses permitted.
You’d have to explain your operation, together with the geographical boundaries, and share your drone registration quantity.
You’d additionally want $100,000 CAD in legal responsibility insurance coverage and a security and emergency plan.
Which parks in Kananaskis Nation are off-limits?
Kananaskis Nation measures only one,500 sq. miles, but it comprises an ecological reserve, campgrounds, and a number of other provincial parks.
Right here’s a full listing of which parks you can not use your drone in:
- Spray Valley Provincial Park
- Sheep River Provincial Park
- Plateau Mountain Ecological Reserve
- Peter Lougheed Provincial Park
- Elbow-Sheep Wildland Provincial Park
- Don Getty Wildland Provincial Park
- Canmore Nordic Centre Provincial Park
- Bragg Creek Provincial Park
- Bow Valley Wildland Provincial Park
- Bow Valley Provincial Park
- Bluerock Wildland Provincial Park
By the best way, though the Plateau Mountain Ecological Reserve isn’t technically a provincial park however an ecological reserve as a substitute, Alberta Parks nonetheless affords it the identical degree of safety as a provincial park.
Don’t plan to fly your drone right here both!
Kananaskis Nation additionally has a number of areas that aren’t official ecological reserves or provincial parks. That mentioned, you continue to shouldn’t threat utilizing your drone within the following areas, because it’s in all probability unlawful:
- Sibbald Meadows Pond Provincial Leisure Space
- Sibbald Lake Provincial Leisure Space
- Strawberry Provincial Leisure Space
- Stoney Creek Provincial Leisure Space
- Sentinel Provincial Leisure Space
- Evan-Thomas Provincial Leisure Space
- Elbow River Valley Space
- Bow Hall Space
Are you able to fly a drone in Kananaskis Village?
Kananaskis Village is but a distinct a part of the realm, though it’s positioned within the Kananaskis Enchancment District. The village is an unincorporated group by the Trans-Canada Freeway.
The small resort group affords cross-country snowboarding, mountain biking, climbing trails, equestrian amenities at Boundary Ranch, downhill snowboarding on the Nakiska Ski Space, and {golfing} on the 36-hole Kananaskis Nation Golf Course.
The place do drones match into the image? Nicely, merely put, they don’t.
You see, Kananaskis Village is part of the Kananaskis Nation park system. Though it’s not technically an ecological reserve or a provincial park, it’s nonetheless doubtless below the jurisdiction of Alberta Parks.
You shouldn’t plan to convey a drone right here!
What’s the punishment for illegally utilizing a drone in Kananaskis?
Nonetheless eager about taking a drone flight in Kananaskis? You may wish to rethink.
A 2017 article printed in RMOToday[2] discusses an incident from that yr involving a drone pilot who illegally entered Peter Lougheed Provincial Park together with his drone.
He needed to pay a wonderful of $287 CAD.
Till then, drone pilots hadn’t obtained any fines for unlawful drone use in Kananaskis Nation, nevertheless it solely appeared to be a matter of time.
A 2015 article additionally from RMO Right this moment mentioned how drones had been rising in quantity and coming into locations they shouldn’t, together with Kananaskis Nation and Canada’s beloved Banff Park.
On the time, it seems that Alberta Parks merely discouraged drone flights however didn’t outlaw them.
The consequences on the wildlife within the space had been already being felt. Goats and bighorn sheep had been pushed away by bigger drones.
The article mentions a United States research from across the identical time that discovered that the center charges of some black bears go up exponentially once they see a drone, though not all bears had been affected.
However we digress. Getting again to the gentleman who took a prohibited drone flight in Kananaskis, he needed to seem in Canmore Provincial Court docket, the place he pled responsible. The decide made clear that as a result of the person fessed as much as his crimes that he was issued the wonderful he was.
That suggests a wonderful may simply be larger when you’ve got a nasty angle.
Whereas we couldn’t discover any extra present information tales about taking drone flights round Kananaskis, if it’s occurred as soon as, it’s in all probability occurred once more and can proceed to occur once more.
Don’t be the drone pilot who makes an avoidable mistake!
Are you able to fly a drone exterior of Kananaskis?
Recalling that Kananaskis isn’t all that enormous, for those who had been within the space, it wouldn’t take you lengthy to enterprise exterior of its boundaries. Can you utilize your drone past the realm?
Nicely, to the north of you, you’ll discover Banff Nationwide Park, and also you already know you’re prohibited from flying there.
To the left are mountain areas similar to Mt. King George and Mt. Assiniboine. You’re additionally not removed from Kootenay State Park.
For those who went south, you’d enterprise into the Bob Creek Wildland, and to the east, you’d be within the coronary heart of Calgary.
You may fly a drone in Calgary, however as for the opposite locales round Kananaskis? It’s a toss-up.
To make sure you solely use your drone in permitted airspace, we suggest you utilize a drone app. For those who see any yellow areas, these are warning zones. Your drone can technically fly in warning zones however ask your self for those who actually wish to probability it.
Pink zones denote restricted airspace, and you’ll’t fly in these zones.
Bear in mind to observe Transport Canada drone legal guidelines for those who discover a permitted place round Kananaskis to launch and land your drone.
You want a pilot’s license in case your drone weighs between 250 grams and 25 kilograms. You may get hold of a primary license when you flip 14 and check for the superior license at 16.
You need to preserve your drone in your line of sight, keep below 400 ft or 122 meters when flying, restrict your primary operations distance from bystanders to 30 meters, avoid marketed occasions and emergency operations (parades, outside occasions like live shows, forest fires, and many others.), fly three nautical miles from airports and one nautical mile from heliports, and provides a large berth to plane.
For those who fly and not using a pilot’s license, you possibly can obtain a wonderful of $1,000 CAD. You’re additionally fined a further $1,000 CAD for flying the place you shouldn’t be and $3,000 CAD for risking the lives of individuals or plane.
Conclusion
The Kananaskis Enchancment District consists of the small and luxe Kananaskis Village and Kananaskis Nation. You’re prohibited from utilizing your drone in a provincial park or ecological space, which Kananaskis Nation is extensively comprised of.
Slightly than attempt to discover a place to make use of your drone and threat getting fined, you’re higher off venturing to a different a part of Alberta and even higher Canada and launching your drone in freer skies.
