When applying for operational authorisation from the national aviation authority, in most cases, remote pilots are not required to be trained by a recognised school (RTF or QE). The operator is allowed to train and examine their remote pilots themselves. This does not apply for the EASA Open Category, or for standard scenario (STS) training. Those are reserved for QEs. When applying for an operational authorization, the operator declares that their remote pilots are sufficiently trained to safely carry out all operations described in the operations manual.

Even though proof of remote pilot training is not required to be submitted as part of the operational authorization request, it is wise to do so. The National Aviation Authority audits all operators on a regular basis, looking for proof of training (training logs, syllabi or exams) and testing the remote pilot’s knowledge of the operations manual, among other things.

Drone Education Centre fully prepares operators for all the above, looking at what EASA and the National Aviation Authority demand, and combining that with what your drone operations require. All obtainable training (on modular level) is made available in one clear document for our clients, called a remote pilot training framework (rptf). Drone Education Centre also offers online proctored examination that is EASA compliant. Optionally, we fully train one or two pilots of your organisation to the highest level at our facility in the Netherlands (former Marine Naval Airbase Valkenburg), to act as senior instructors for in-house training. Instructor training content is optionally available as stand-alone on request to get you started.

All our content can be hosted in your own white label drone academy with your look and feel (example: yourcompanyname.droneacademy.eu). We work with Moodle, the world’s largest learning management system (LMS) and can provide you with guidance to create your own training and setup exams for internal staff independently. It all starts with going through our DTF and determining the required scope for EASA and operations-related training. Please contact us for further assistance or look at our remote pilot training framework here.