How to Get a Part 91 COA or Waiver for a Public Safety Drone Program

In April 2025 the FAA replaced the way public safety agencies get beyond-visual-line-of-sight authority. The Tactical BVLOS and First Responder BVLOS COAs are gone and are not renewed at expiration. In their place is an expedited Part 91.113 Certificate of Waiver / Authorization (CoW/A), processed by AFS-750 in Flight Standards rather than the Air Traffic Organization, valid for 48 months, and routinely issued in two to three days. As of the FAA's 31 July 2026 update, 985 Part 91.113 waivers have been issued. Between April 2025 and February 2026 the FAA issued more BVLOS waivers to public safety than in the preceding seven years combined.

Nearly every guide, consultant deck, and vendor white paper written before mid-2025 describes a process that no longer exists. If you are reading advice about a 90-day BVLOS application, a visual observer requirement, or a 24-month term, you are reading about the old system.

This guide is for the person who has to assemble and submit the package: who qualifies (many agencies do not), which package to file, what the waiver waives and does not cover, how to keep it from being returned, and what to do with the legacy COAs you may already hold.

What changed in April 2025, and why older guides are wrong

• Different office. Applications go to Flight Standards (AFS-750) by email at 9-AVS-AFS-750-91.113Waivers@faa.gov, not through the ATO's COA portal. There is no online form.
• 48-month validity, up from 24. Your renewal cycle doubled.
• Two to three days of observed processing. One documented approval, Noblesville PD as reported by Police1, came back in 23 hours and 47 minutes.
• No NOTAM requirement and no monthly reporting. The legacy blanket and jurisdictional COAs still carry both.
• Visual observers are encouraged but not required. This single line is what made drone-as-first-responder programs economically viable, because VO staffing was the dominant recurring cost of BVLOS operations.

Datestamp what you read. The defensible statements as of August 2026: the FAA had issued 985 Part 91.113 waivers as of its 31 July 2026 page update, and more than 1,000 agencies held Part 91 BVLOS waivers as of February 2026 per an EFF FOIA release. Agency-count totals from different sources conflict; do not quote a precise national total.

COA, CoW, CoW/A: getting the terminology right

Three terms circulate interchangeably and are not the same thing.

• COA — Certificate of Waiver or Authorization, issued by the Air Traffic Organization. The instrument behind blanket and jurisdictional COAs and supplemental airspace requests.
• CoW — Certificate of Waiver on FAA Form 7711-2, issued by Flight Standards (AFS-750), granting relief from specific Part 91 operating rules.
• CoW/A — the FAA's shorthand for the combined instrument under the 91.113 process.

The distinction that governs your operation: a waiver relieves you of an operating rule; an authorization grants access to airspace. The 91.113 instrument gives both, but not equally. The waiver half is broad. The authorization half is capped, and that cap is where most programs get into trouble.

Eligibility: the dual test, and why many agencies fail it

You must satisfy two independent legal tests, not one.

First, Public Aircraft Operator status under 49 U.S.C. § 40102(a)(41). Subparagraph (C) covers aircraft owned and operated by a State, the District of Columbia, a territory, or a political subdivision; (D) covers aircraft exclusively leased for at least 90 continuous days. 49 U.S.C. § 40125 sets the qualifying governmental functions: national defense, intelligence, firefighting, search and rescue, law enforcement including prisoner transport, aeronautical research, and biological or geological resource management.

Second, Public Safety Organization status under 49 U.S.C. § 44806(e), added by Public Law 118-63 § 926: an organization that "primarily engages in activities related to the safety and well-being of the general public," including law enforcement, fire departments, EMS, and others protecting the public in matters of safety and security.

The FAA's own Public Safety BVLOS/OOP/OOMV Waiver Flow Chart, current 28 January 2026, states it without diplomacy: "Many Public Safety Do NOT Qualify."

The three ways agencies fail

Volunteer organizations. Volunteer fire companies and volunteer SAR teams typically do not qualify as public aircraft operators, however genuinely public-safety their mission. A 501(c)(3) that responds to emergencies is not a political subdivision of a state.

Unresolved political-subdivision status. AC 00-1.1B is explicit that this status is "determined by the Attorney General of the State." Special districts, university police departments, and regional authorities frequently assume they qualify without ever obtaining that determination. Get it in writing before you build the package, not after AFS-750 asks.

The commercial-purpose trap. Verbatim from the FAA's checklist: "Operating for a commercial purpose, such as seeking reimbursement for operations from another agency, nullifies Public Aircraft Operations." Mutual-aid cost recovery is the classic failure. Note the asymmetry: a government entity may pay a private operator to conduct a public aircraft operation; the prohibition runs against the entity receiving compensation. Status is also determined flight by flight, not once at the program level. The Part 107 versus Part 91 public aircraft guide works through those distinctions.

If you fail the PAO test

Use Part 107 PSO Shielded Operations, submitted through AVSHub. It authorizes BVLOS to 200 ft AGL, or 100 ft above an obstruction not to exceed 400 ft, in Class G only, night permitted with compliant lighting. The FAA calls it a "near equivalent." Volunteer fire departments, SAR teams, and nonprofits use this path. It is a legitimate program foundation, not a consolation prize.

Choosing your package: 200-foot shielded or 400-foot DAA

The CoW/A contains two mitigation methods. You pick one when you apply.

File the shielded package unless you have a specific, funded reason not to. Roughly seven of eight applicants do. The shielded weather minimums are dramatically better: 1 statute mile and clear of clouds versus 3 statute miles with standard cloud clearance. In marginal weather the shielded operator flies and the DAA operator does not, which is the opposite of what most program managers assume when they see "400 feet."

The DAA path also carries real equipment obligations. Systems must be FCC-approved for aviation use, compliant with ASTM and/or RTCA standards, and capable of detecting both cooperative and non-cooperative aircraft. Active radar may require an FCC Station License under 47 CFR Part 87, a separate filing with a separate agency that agencies routinely discover late.

Start shielded, amend later. The waiver runs 48 months and can be amended. File shielded now, stand the program up, and pursue the DAA variant once you have procured and validated a system. Filing for capability you cannot yet demonstrate only costs you time.

What the waiver waives, and the conditions it attaches

The issued instrument grants relief from 14 CFR 91.113(b), 91.119(b)–(c), 91.126(d), 91.127(c), 91.129(c), 91.130(c), 91.131(a)(1) and (c)(2), 91.155, and 91.209(a), per an issued certificate, the Wake County Sheriff's Office CoW 91.113-2026-01001.

In exchange you accept standing conditions:

• Aircraft under 55 lbs maximum takeoff weight, maximum speed 87 knots (100 mph).
• Standard Remote ID under 14 CFR Part 89 for BVLOS unless the FAA authorizes otherwise. A broadcast module is not sufficient for BVLOS.
• Anti-collision lighting visible for 3 statute miles, operating at all times, day or night. "Lights out" operations are prohibited, which forecloses a profile some tactical units expect.
• ADS-B In on both 978 and 1090 MHz.
• Visual observers encouraged but not required.
• A pre-flight hazard assessment within 1 statute mile, covering low-level helicopter and airplane operations, helipads, grass strips, airports, MOAs below 500 ft AGL, pedestrian and vehicle traffic, and the highest obstruction, briefed to all flight personnel.
• Return-to-home programmed before takeoff, constrained to 200 ft AGL or lower (or within 50 ft of an obstruction) in Class G, and to the UASFM altitude in controlled surface areas.

Reporting obligations survive. NTSB reporting under 49 CFR Part 830 is not waived. Report any event where the aircraft came within 500 ft of another aircraft, vertically or horizontally, with closest-point-of-approach measurements, and any loss-of-control event. Retain all flight times including monthly totals, available to the Administrator on request. 14 CFR Part 111 Pilot Records Database requirements still apply. The waiver does not authorize TFR operations; that requires SGI.

The airspace cap: your waiver is not unlimited airspace access

This is the most commonly misread feature of the instrument.

The trap. The waiver bundles airspace authorization only up to the UASFM grid altitude or 200 ft AGL, whichever is lower. That is the entire authorization half of the instrument. Everything else requires a separate approval.

Anything beyond that cap — above 400 ft AGL in Class G, controlled airspace with no active UASFM grid, or special-use, prohibited, or restricted airspace — requires a separate ATO COA through CAPS at caps.faa.gov/coaportal. Apply after the waiver issues and at least 60 business days ahead. That is roughly three calendar months against a two-to-three-day waiver turnaround, so run it as a parallel, slower workstream from the start.

Agencies routinely read "waiver of 91.129(c)" or "waiver of 91.131" as blanket permission to fly in Class B or Class D. It is not. Those waivers relieve the operating rules that apply in that airspace; access to the airspace comes from the authorization half, which stops at the UASFM value. UAS Facility Maps, LAANC, and the manual paths are covered in the airspace authorization guide.

How to apply for a Part 91.113 waiver, step by step

Step one: request the packet. Email 9-AVS-AFS-750-91.113Waivers@faa.gov and ask for the current Part 91.113 waiver application package. Use what they send. Do not reconstruct the checklist from a copy someone posted in a forum.

Step two: assemble six documents.

1. FAA Form 7711-2. Items 11 through 16 are N/A for this application. Item 17 must be completed, dated, and signed.
2. PSO/PAO letter certifying your status under PL 118-63 § 926(e), signed by senior leadership.
3. Public Declaration Letter from your legal counsel, certifying governmental status. This is not the § 40125 written declaration, which goes to your responsible FSDO when a civil contractor operates on your behalf. Agencies conflate these constantly.
4. Concept of Operations (ConOps), as a separate attachment.
5. Completed checklist, initialed box by box by the Responsible Person.
6. CMD-DAA worksheet, only if you are pursuing the 400-foot DAA variant.

Step three: write a ConOps that says something. It must cover what your organization does as a public aircraft operator, what it uses drones for, and the part that gets skipped: under what specific circumstances it needs BVLOS, operations over people, or operations over moving vehicles. Name your call types, launch sites, crew configuration, airspace, and hazard environment. A ConOps that could describe any agency in the country describes yours poorly.

Step four: name your Responsible Person. The FAA requires a senior official: "Chief, Assistant Chief, Chief Pilot, or other senior level person" who "accepts direct responsibility for safety of operations conducted under this Waiver." Read that sentence aloud before they initial the checklist. They are not signing an administrative form; they are accepting responsibility for every flight under the certificate for the next four years.

Which portal for which request

CADZ is the eventual CAPS replacement, but per the FAA's own page it "is currently only available for Department of Defense (DOD) users," and no CAPS sunset date has been published.

Why applications get returned, and how to draft around it

The FAA's own materials document the causes of delay. They are almost entirely clerical:

• Illegible submissions. The checklist says so explicitly. Type everything. Do not submit a phone photograph of a form.
• Item 17 unsigned or undated.
• Checklist boxes not initialed individually. Every box.
• Items 11 through 16 completed when they should read N/A.
• Missing § 926(e) certification letter.
• A generic ConOps.
• Applying for the 400-foot DAA variant without a compliant system or the CMD-DAA worksheet.

Then the substantive failures, worse because resubmitting does not fix them: no Attorney General determination of political subdivision status, a volunteer organization that fails the PAO test, or a cost-recovery arrangement that nullifies public aircraft status.

Everything you write is binding. The application becomes part of the certificate. If your ConOps says you will use two-person crews, or fly only within a named jurisdiction, or launch only from three rooftop sites, that is now a condition of your waiver. Write what you will actually do for the next 48 months, not the most conservative-sounding version of it.

The drafting rule: request the minimum you genuinely need, describe it precisely, amend later. A narrow waiver that issues in three days beats a broad one that generates a request for information.

Legacy blanket and jurisdictional COAs: keep them or let them lapse

Two legacy instruments remain available through CAPS, and many agencies still hold one.

• Blanket Public Safety COA — CONUS-wide, Class G at or below 400 ft AGL, day and night with appropriate lighting and training, sUAS under 55 lbs.
• Jurisdictional COA — UAS of any weight, in a defined geographic area including controlled airspace, within the agency's jurisdiction.

Both are VLOS only. Both require NOTAMs and monthly reporting. Terms run not more than 24 months, renewals go in at least 60 business days before expiration, and the FAA targets a response within 60 days of a complete application.

Does that burden buy you anything? If the 91.113 CoW/A covers your missions, usually no: the waiver carries neither the NOTAM obligation nor the monthly report, runs twice as long, and covers BVLOS the legacy COAs never did. Letting a blanket COA lapse is frequently the right call.

Two exceptions argue for keeping a jurisdictional COA. It is the only one of the three covering aircraft over 55 lbs, which matters for heavy-lift and fixed-wing programs. And an existing COA is one of the two ways to be SGI-eligible, so an agency without Part 107-certificated pilots should think hard before dropping its last COA.

SGI: emergency authority, and the fact most agencies miss

Special Governmental Interest authorization is how you fly inside a TFR or otherwise outside your normal limits during an emergency. Contact the System Operations Support Center at 202-267-8276 or 9-ATOR-HQ-SOSC@faa.gov, under FAA Order JO 7210.3. Practitioners universally describe the SOSC as staffed around the clock, though faa.gov does not publish hours.

SGI amends authority you already hold. It is not a standalone authorization. You must already hold either a current Part 107 remote pilot certificate or an existing COA. An agency with neither cannot use SGI, no matter how genuine the emergency. Verify this before you need it, not at 2 a.m. during a search.

Qualifying operations per the FAA: firefighting including wildfire suppression and red-flag monitoring, search and rescue, law enforcement, utility and critical infrastructure restoration, disaster-recovery damage assessment for insurance claims, and media coverage providing public information during emergencies.

On timing: VLOS emergency approvals "may be issued in minutes," but BVLOS SGI typically requires a TFR and involves extended processing time. If your DFR concept depends on flying BVLOS inside a TFR on short notice, that is not a plan. Non-time-critical requests go through the FAA/TSA Waiver & Airspace Access Program portal under "Part 107 Special Government Interest"; time-sensitive requests go by phone.

Frequently asked questions

How long does a Part 91.113 waiver take to get approved?

Observed processing is two to three days from a complete submission, with one documented approval returned in 23 hours and 47 minutes. That is the AFS-750 expedited process introduced in April 2025 and it is dramatically faster than the legacy COA path, which targets a response within 60 days. The speed depends entirely on the package being complete and legible; an incomplete submission goes back to you and restarts the clock.

Does a public safety COA let my agency fly anywhere?

No. The Part 91.113 certificate of waiver or authorization bundles airspace access only up to the UAS Facility Map grid altitude or 200 feet AGL, whichever is lower. Operations above 400 feet AGL in Class G, in controlled airspace with no active UASFM grid, or in special-use, prohibited, or restricted airspace require a separate Air Traffic Organization COA through the CAPS portal, applied for at least 60 business days in advance.

Do we still need visual observers for BVLOS?

Not under the current Part 91.113 waiver, where visual observers are encouraged but not required. This is the change that made drone-as-first-responder programs affordable, because VO staffing was the largest recurring cost of BVLOS operations. Older guidance requiring visual observers reflects the retired Tactical BVLOS and First Responder BVLOS COAs, which the FAA no longer renews at expiration.

Can a volunteer fire department get a Part 91 waiver?

Usually not. The waiver requires both public aircraft operator status under 49 U.S.C. 40102(a)(41) and public safety organization status under 49 U.S.C. 44806(e). Volunteer organizations typically fail the public aircraft operator test because they are not political subdivisions of a state. The FAA's own flow chart states that many public safety organizations do not qualify. The alternative is Part 107 PSO Shielded Operations, submitted through AVSHub.

What is the difference between a COA and a CoW?

A COA is a Certificate of Waiver or Authorization issued by the FAA's Air Traffic Organization, the instrument behind blanket and jurisdictional public safety authorizations. A CoW is a Certificate of Waiver issued on FAA Form 7711-2 by Flight Standards, granting relief from specific Part 91 operating rules. CoW/A is the FAA's shorthand for the combined instrument. A waiver relieves an operating rule; an authorization grants airspace access.

Should we apply for the 200-foot or the 400-foot package?

Apply for the 200-foot obstruction-shielded package unless you already own a compliant detect-and-avoid system. About 87 percent of applicants choose shielded. Its weather minimums are far better, at 1 statute mile visibility and clear of clouds, versus 3 statute miles with standard cloud clearance for the DAA variant. DAA systems must also meet FCC and ASTM or RTCA standards and may require an FCC Part 87 station license for active radar.

Do we need to keep our old blanket COA?

Usually not, if the Part 91.113 waiver covers your missions. The legacy blanket and jurisdictional COAs are visual-line-of-sight only, require NOTAMs and monthly reporting, and run 24 months instead of 48. Two reasons to keep a jurisdictional COA: it is the only instrument covering aircraft over 55 pounds, and holding a COA is one of the two ways to remain eligible for Special Governmental Interest emergency authorization.

What to do next

If you have not confirmed eligibility, start there. Get a written political-subdivision determination from your state Attorney General's office if there is any ambiguity, and audit any mutual-aid agreement involving reimbursement for flight operations, because cost recovery nullifies public aircraft status.

If eligibility is settled, email AFS-750 for the packet this week. Assemble the six documents, file the 200-foot shielded package, and have your Responsible Person read the responsibility language before initialing. Expect an answer in days. Then, separately, identify any airspace you need above the UASFM-or-200-foot cap and start the CAPS request, because that one runs on a 60-business-day clock.

What remains after issuance is recordkeeping: monthly flight-time totals available to the Administrator on request, NTSB and near-miss reporting, Pilot Records Database compliance, and a 48-month renewal date. Those records have to live somewhere more durable than a shared spreadsheet.