Level 1 Complex Operator Templates — ORA, CONOPS, Site Survey & Contingency Cards

The paperwork a Level 1 Complex operation actually runs on. Six templates, each built on the specific regulation that requires something to be established, recorded, briefed or carried — and each one names that regulation, so you can see why it is there.

WHAT IS IN IT

Concept of operations — structured on AC 903-001 section 5.0. Purpose and scope, the system and its declaration status, the operational volume, the crew, environmental limits, and how the flight ends.

Operational risk assessment worksheet — the full AC 903-001 method, step by step: the ground risk table, the single mitigation Canada actually allows, air risk, the SAIL matrix, containment robustness, the detect-and-avoid objectives, and all twenty-four operational safety objectives with space to record how each is met.

BVLOS site survey — the eight factors of CARs 901.27 including paragraph (h), the one that only applies to BVLOS operations. Structured around the operational volume rather than the launch site, because that is what the section actually requires.

Crew and visual observer briefing card — duties, sectors, communications discipline, the stop authority, today's limits, and a signature block. Answers to CARs 901.28(b) and 901.20.

Lost link contingency card — ten steps, with blanks for your configured failsafe behaviour.

Fly-away contingency card — ten steps and an event log, in the order that puts people first.

BUILT TO BE CARRIED

CARs 901.23(3) requires your procedures to be reviewed before the flight by, and to be immediately available to, each crew member. A copy on a laptop in the truck is not immediately available to an observer standing two nautical miles away. The briefing and contingency cards are designed to print and laminate.

THE PART A COURSE CANNOT GIVE YOU

Ground school teaches you what an operational risk assessment is. It does not hand you the worksheet, and if it does, you lose it when your access expires. This is the working document, and it is yours permanently — for this job, and the one in eighteen months, and the audit after that. Free revisions for twelve months.

WHAT THIS IS NOT

These templates are a starting structure. They are not an RPAS operations manual, they are not approved by Transport Canada, and completing them does not by itself demonstrate compliance. Your operations manual under CARs 901.217 must reflect your operation, and your procedures under CARs 901.23 must reflect the instructions of your aircraft's manufacturer or declarant. Adapt them; do not adopt them unchanged.

Nor is this ground school. It is not the 20 hours required under CARs 901.90(c), which must be delivered by a training provider that has made a declaration under section 921.08 of Standard 921.

Drone's View Canada is an independent publisher and is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or produced on behalf of Transport Canada.