While flying a small unmanned aircraft in Class G airspace during the day, the remote pilot sights a manned, fixed-wing aircraft approaching head-on. What action is required?

Part 107 requires a small unmanned aircraft to yield the right of way to all other aircraft, and this scenario asks what yielding looks like in a head-on geometry. The established convention for converging head-on is that each aircraft alters course to the right, and applying it here does two things: it opens lateral separation, and it does so in the direction the manned pilot expects if they have seen the unmanned aircraft at all. Predictability matters, because an evasive move in an unexpected direction can defeat the other pilot's own avoidance. The wrong answers illustrate the three standard errors. Descending below 400 feet is not a manoeuvre at all here, since the aircraft is already restricted to that band. Maintaining course inverts the rule entirely — manned aircraft never yield to unmanned ones. And landing immediately, while sometimes right in an emergency, is a slower response than turning when an aircraft is closing head-on. Descending clear as well as turning is good practice, but the yielding manoeuvre is the required action.

Part 107 requires yielding the right of way to all other aircraft, and in a head-on geometry the established convention is for each aircraft to alter course to the right, opening separation predictably.

Part 107 requires small unmanned aircraft to yield the right of way to all other aircraft and prohibits creating a collision hazard. The conventional head-on avoidance is for each aircraft to alter course to the right.

Head-On, Go Right. Predictable is safer than clever when someone is closing on you.

Any option suggesting manned aircraft yield to unmanned ones is always wrong. That rule has no exceptions.

• •Believing manned aircraft must yield
• •Treating a descent within the existing altitude band as an avoidance manoeuvre
• •Choosing an unpredictable direction of turn