Free EU drone exam course, A1/A3
Every card of the A1/A3 course of We Drone, readable here without installing anything: what to remember, the classic trap, and the exact regulation each one comes from. Written by wewe from Regulations (EU) 2019/947 and 2019/945 and from published national law.
32 cards, 9 subjects, free.
The cards, subject by subject
Air safety
Visual line of sight, and what breaks it
Visual line of sight is the condition that holds up the whole ‘open’ category: it is what stands in for radar, air traffic control and anti-collision.
The manned aircraft goes first
Between two manned aircraft, you reason in terms of right of way. Between a drone and a manned aircraft, you do not: the burden of avoidance falls…
The flight environment: obstacles, people, light
The safety of a flight is decided on the ground, by looking around you. The regulation frames it as an obligation to check, and EASA details what to…
Airspace restrictions
The 120 metres, and the trap of terrain
The maximum height in the ‘open’ category is 120 metres. The figure is easy; measuring it is not, and that is exactly where the examination waits…
UAS geographical zones
The regulation is common to the whole Union, but what you are allowed to do depends on the ground you fly over.
Aerodromes and manned traffic: where the rule is
Many candidates look for the European distance to keep from an aerodrome. It does not exist in the regulation, and understanding why is worth more…
Getting informed before flying
The information obligation falls on the remote pilot, before every operation, and the word that makes it binding is ‘updated’.
Aviation regulation
Got a drone? What the law asks before the first flight
Before the first flight, the European regulation asks for a few formalities, and not all of them depend on the mass of the aircraft.
Open, specific, certified
The European regulation does not classify drones into three categories: it classifies OPERATIONS. The same aircraft can fall into all three…
A1, A2, A3: what actually separates them
The ‘open’ category is divided into three subcategories. People assume they classify drones; in reality they classify PROXIMITY TO PEOPLE.
Classes C0 to C4
The five classes marked by the manufacturer set what an aircraft is allowed to do. They rise by mass, and each step closes a door.
Registering as a UAS operator
Registration identifies a PERSON, not an aircraft. It is the most misunderstood formality in the regulation, because the 250-gram threshold everyone…
Minimum age and remote pilot competency
Two distinct requirements bear on the person at the controls: an age and a proven competency. They do not move together (the age can be lowered by a…
Validity of certificates and moving from one country to another
A certificate lives five years, then is revalidated, but not in the same way depending on whether it is still valid or already expired.
Human performance limitations
Attention, workload, vision
The whole ‘open’ category rests on two human resources: seeing, and staying focused. The regulation and its means of compliance treat them as…
Fatigue, alcohol, medication: the pilot's fitness
A single sentence of the regulation carries this whole subject, and the examination almost never asks about its first half.
Operational procedures
Preparing the flight and surveying the site
The examination syllabus splits operational procedures into three phases: before flight, in flight, after flight.
In flight: keeping control, losing the link
The ‘open’ category does not prohibit automatic modes. It prohibits putting yourself in a situation where you can no longer take back control.
After the flight: incidents, accidents, reporting
The syllabus retains only two tasks after the flight, but a third obligation can arise: reporting. Many candidates believe recreational flying is…
UAS general knowledge
The mass that counts: MTOM, payload, thresholds
Almost every door in the ‘open’ category opens or closes on a mass. You still have to know which one: the catalogue figure is never the…
Batteries: what the regulation says, and what it does not
No European text of the ‘open’ category sets a temperature, a charging rule or a storage method for batteries.
Positioning, geo-awareness, flight modes
On-board functions are reassuring, and that is exactly what makes them treacherous. The regulation assigns them a precise role (to alert, to…
Privacy and data protection
The GDPR applied to aerial filming
A drone that films does two things at once: an aerial operation, and a processing of personal data. The two regimes are independent, and being in…
Informing, keeping, erasing
Once the images are on the memory card, the obligations do not stop: you have to know whom to inform, how long to keep them, and what to do when the…
Insurance
Third-party liability insurance at European level
Regulation (EC) No 785/2004 sets the insurance requirements for air carriers and aircraft operators in the Union.
Security
Security: protected link, identification, reporting
Security targets the malicious act of a third party, where safety targets failure and error. That distinction is what justifies a whole subject in…
National law, country by country
Each country adds its own layer to the European baseline: age, registration, geographical zones, insurance, exam procedure. Only the modules available in this language are listed.
France: what national law adds
The European regulation lays the base, but France adds a layer of its own on top: a lowered age, two registers instead of one, a security device…
Belgium: the portal, the insurance and the geozones
In Belgium the European base is supplemented by an arrêté royal of 8 November 2020 and an arrêté ministériel on zones.
Germany: what federal law adds
Regulation (EU) 2019/947 is the same in Hamburg as in Marseille. What changes in Germany is who issues what, who supervises what, and above all a…
Netherlands: what national law adds
The Netherlands does not lower the age and does not create a second register, but it adds what few States do: figures for distances from roads…
Spain: the national base after 2024
Spanish drone law changed its basis on 25 June 2024: Real Decreto 517/2024 replaced Real Decreto 1036/2017, which was repealed.
Italy: ENAC, d-flight and a marking scheme that takes points away
The European regulation is the same from Lisbon to Helsinki. What changes from one country to another is the authority, the registration counter…
The A2 course is in the app
The A2 course (meteorology, UAS flight performance, ground risk mitigation) is not published on the web. It is in the app, with its 90 questions, in the A2 option, a one-time €6.99 purchase that also adds the questions of your country and unlimited mock exams.
Read the course in the app, with the diagrams
In the app, some cards carry diagrams drawn for the exam, your reading progress is tracked subject by subject, and the questions with explained answers sit next to the course.