Indoor drone flights & safety in NL warehouses

“Can you legally fly a drone inside our building?” is one of the first questions facility managers ask us, and it is the right question. Flying indoors, around people and stock, is not something to improvise. Here is how we think about safety and compliance for indoor inventory flights in the Netherlands.

Indoor vs. outdoor: a different rule set

Outdoor drone operations in the EU fall under EASA rules, with registration and pilot competency requirements administered nationally. Indoors, inside a closed building, the open-air airspace rules work differently, but that does not mean “anything goes.” The duty of care shifts to operating safely around your staff, equipment and stock, which is where preparation matters most.

We treat every indoor flight as an operation that has to be planned, briefed and flown to a standard, regardless of which rule technically applies on a given day.

What RDW registration means

In the Netherlands, drone operators register with the RDW. Registration ties an operator to an ID and to the responsibilities that come with flying. When we say Hover Logix is RDW registered, it means there is an accountable, identifiable operator behind every flight, operating within the Dutch framework, not an anonymous hobby flight in your building.

What “certified drone pilot” means

Certification is about demonstrated competency: understanding the aircraft, planning a flight, managing risk and handling the unexpected. A certified pilot has been trained and assessed, not just handed a controller. For an indoor inventory flight, that competency shows up in the boring, important details:

• Pre-flight inspection of the aircraft and props
• A planned route that keeps safe distances from racking, sprinklers and people
• Clear ground markings and exclusion zones during active flying
• A plan for what happens if something goes wrong

How we keep a live warehouse safe

Most of our customers do not want to stop operating while we count. Flying safely around a working site comes down to a few principles:

1. Plan the route before we arrive. We work from your layout so the flight path is known in advance.
2. Fly in agreed windows and zones. We section the building so your team keeps working away from the active flight area.
3. Keep humans clear of the active zone. Temporary markings and a spotter keep the flight area controlled.
4. Conservative flight envelope. Indoors we fly slow and predictable; there is no benefit to speed near racking.

Compliance is not a certificate on the wall. It is a flight that is planned, briefed and flown so that nobody on your team has to think twice.

Why this matters for your insurance and audit trail

A documented, compliant operation is also an easier conversation with your insurer and your auditors. Because each flight is planned and each location is captured as timestamped photo evidence, there is a clear record of what was done, when and how. That record is useful long after the drone has packed up.

If you would like to walk through the safety plan for your specific site, get in touch and we will talk through exactly how a flight in your building would run.