That doesn't mean that the drone owners are guaranteed to fly, though. The FAA tells The Verge that there can easily be other legal restrictions keeping them on the ground. Also, this is sometimes a catch-all for activities the pilot might be asked to do, rather than the primary goal. Even if they never intend to help officials in a crisis, though, this poses a problem. It suggests that exemption requests are getting out of hand for both applicants (who are so worried about the rules that they apply just in case) and the FAA itself (which allows those broad exemptions). It may take a while before cooler heads prevail and pilots only get exemptions that they're likely to need.