Want to share my experience concerning this topic. I do real estate photography & now have added aerial shots. I read article after article how difficult it was to get your Section 333 Exemption & how costly it can be, attorney fees $$$ were all over the place, more then I can afford. Filing it yourself is not really all that hard, believe me if I can do it so can you. There is a portal that shows you all the letters people have submitted requesting the exemption along with the FAA approval. Some of these filings are quite lengthy & should be depending on what you are doing so I get using an attorney, aerial videos, area mapping, bridge inspections, tower inspections, utility pole inspections, surveillance, the list is endless. I just want to take some aerial photos of property listings for the agents who hire me, plain & simple. I read through pages of approved letters getting an idea of how my request should be worded & found quite a few that was geared to my situation. DON'T COPY ANYONE'S REQUEST WORD FOR WORD! I didn't but just wanted to share that with you cause if they catch you doing this it will be rejected. I went to the FAA website & followed the instructions, my exemption request was 2 pages & you submit on line, cost was nothing. I know this appears to be pretty thin but it's the truth. I waited 5 months & received my exemption, no problems what so ever. My exemption states that the aircraft I submitted is approved for 2 yrs for aerial photography & collecting aerial data for the purpose of marketing real estate. I'm waiting for my N-Numbers, that's something you can't do on line, you need to get that form from the FAA & they will send you a few blank forms if you email them, you can call you local office as well. You are still able to fly as long as you have the pink copy in your possession when you fly along with your FAA approval letter that states you Exemption Number. Just recently I added a new aircraft, P3P, sent in my request to amend my exemption to add my P3P to the fleet. At present I fly the Blade Chroma, its ok but wanted to upgrade. Thinking of selling my Chroma but until I get some hrs in the air with the P3P & feel comfortable I'm gonna hang onto it. The other thing you have to do once you get your approval is to follow a monthly flight log that has to be submitting via email to the FAA. The information they want you to submit is mentioned in the approved exemption letter along with the email address. As for myself I created my own flight log when I purchased my first aircraft & maintained it methodically on my pc, it states times I flew, date, location, reason for flying, hrs spent, & description of the purpose of the flight whether it be practice time or real estate photos.
I don't know of any cases that a drone has caused an airplane accident but its coming, boy I hope not but that's a pipe dream, there are many irresponsible people showing off on youtube how high they are flying above the clouds. These people say it won't do anything to a plane, are they engineers? Big birds have broken cockpit windows on passenger planes, can you image what a 2.5lb quad might do? This will be a black eye to all of us, as soon as this happens the public will want to know what the FAA is going to do about drones. I predict they will start by reviewing who is conforming to the rules they put forth & anyone not conforming will have their approved exemption terminated or put on hold status. The FAA will show the public they are cracking down on individuals who don't comply with the regulations they put forth, but who will monitor these people, no one really, but it gets the monkey off their backs by saying we terminated their approval what they do is their business & we (FAA) can't be held responsible for lose of life, meaning don't sue us we didn't give them permission to fly. Bottom line here is you have to document what you are doing, fly safe, & follow the rules so you don't give anyone reason to terminate your exemption. This whole drone thing has taken the FAA by storm in recent years and is growing legs quickly. Its always easier to get something approved then to convince some one to give you another chance. It's just paperwork, the filing is free, the 27K fine is not.