First , i'm talking about the "standard nut's " drone , everybody is scared about . The others are regulated , registrated , a police officer is looking over the shoulder of the operator every flight - no problem .
" It is extremely beneficial to have two people doing pre flight checks"
Meh - 2 man preflight on a Phantom ? Or parrot ? Or a hubsan X4 ?
" fast jets are not always located by sound"
Fast jets are looking for trouble at 1000 feet , before getting hit by a drone they will hit 20 crows , 100 sparrows , 30 pidgeons and a stork .
" there may be more than one aircraft"
One is enought to get me to put down the thing till he is gone .
" plenty of other air users make little sound"
Ninja paraglider on a empty country field would surprise the hell out of me too . Ok , spotters are good (mandatory ) near such agrement fields .
" the drone pilot may be concentrating on a monitor"
That does not make me deaf
" people may encroach on the landing area, and the sound of the drone itself may mask other sounds."
Agree , near noisy places spotters are good .But the drone itself at 50 meters is barely audible , at 100m is already silent .
If flying in a controlled environment such as a model airfield, it may be acceptable to fly solo, but in my opinion flying solo in any area accessed by the public is not safe.
Agree - flying over people with anything over 500g is potentially dangerous .That include full scale things too . But at least the drones can avoid this situation -so i agree - no flying near people