Texas Department of Public Safety

The Texas Department of Public Safety (TXDPS*) is probably the largest public safety uncrewed aircraft vehicle (UAV) operator in the USA, its uncrewed aerial system (UAS) program having grown since its inception in 2017 to 368 air vehicles and 325 pilots.

In 2023, a record year, there were 51,674 flights that accumulated 12,344 flight hours. TXDPS uses a wide range of drones, from fixed-wing vertical takeoff and landing (VTOL) aircraft and large quadcopters to small units designed for tactical interior building clearances. Almost all are commercial, off-the-shelf (COTS) products and suppliers include Autel Robotics (including the Dragonfish VTOL tiltrotor), DJI and PDW. Missions include officer safety overwatch, locating suspects, search and rescue (SAR), disaster support, aerial observation support, crash reconstruction, crime scene photography, and communication tower inspections.

All of these come under the oversight of the DPS Aircraft Operations Division, which also has 14 Airbus AS350 helicopters, seven of which are hoist equipped, one hoist-equipped Airbus EC145 helicopter and one hoist-equipped Bell 412EP, which is also capable of water drops for fire suppression. It also has two Cessna 206 single-engine aircraft, four Cessna 208 Caravan single-engine turboprops, two Pilatus PC-12 single turboprops and a King Air 350 twin turboprop. These operate from 11 air stations across the state.

Users of UASs for TXDPS include personnel from the Texas Highway Patrol, Texas Rangers, Intelligence and Counterterrorism, Criminal Investigations, Aircraft Operations, and Training Operations distributed across the state. Aircraft Operations has personnel headquartered in Austin who are responsible for the program’s management, maintenance, training and standard operating procedures. The team is headed by Captain Aaron Fritch.
 

The greatest demand for UAS operations is along the US border with Mexico, where missions include the detection of smuggling activities, as well as illegal immigration

He said the greatest demand for UAS operations (about 60% of all monthly flights) is along the US border with Mexico, which is where one of the only non-COTS UASs is deployed, a PDW C100 quadcopter, which utilizes a high-definition intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR) and infrared (IR) camera payload, with a flight endurance of over an hour. A second C100 is currently in Austin and is expected to be deployed to another part of the border. Missions include the detection of smuggling activities (narcotics, weapons, currency and people), as well as illegal immigration.

The next greatest demand comes from the Texas Highway Patrol to record the sites of fatal traffic collisions on rural roadways, of which there are up to 1,500 each year. Wreckage must be mapped and distances measured to produce a to-scale diagram of the incident. The ability to quickly deploy a drone with a high-resolution camera and capture imagery that can be processed using photogrammetry software reduces time onsite from several hours to just 15–20 minutes. An important added benefit is that roads can be reopened more quickly, reducing delays and the risk of secondary collisions.

Radio tower inspections are also carried out for TXDPS. Recently a 100ft-plus tower was struck by lightning and a UAS inspection was carried out with live video being streamed back for instant analysis, clearly a safer and a cheaper option than having someone climb up there.

Disaster response is another important mission as Texas can suffer tornadoes, hurricanes and wildfires. For the latter, a drone can use its IR camera to see through the smoke and identify the hot spots. Firefighting crews can then be deployed much more efficiently. After the fire has been extinguished, the drone can be used to help determine the acreage that has been burnt. This also applies to measuring the extent of flooding and the swath of damage from tornadoes. Although no large-scale UAS deployments have been made for the aftermath of a hurricane, training is carried out annually that integrates UAS and helicopter operation for such a scenario.

Hurricane Harvey, a Category 4 hurricane that made landfall in Texas and Louisiana in August 2017, caused widespread flooding in the Houston area. Fritch said the helicopter crews were continuously carrying out hoist rescues, but there are many other missions in disaster relief operations that need to be carried out from the air, and this is where UASs will play an important part in the future. For example, they might be used to determine where urgent cases are located or whether a bridge or a roadway is still passable. A further benefit of the drone is that it can deploy payloads in flight, so a flotation device could be dropped to someone cut off by floods to keep them safe until rescue personnel reach them, or at least help them to stay alive if they end up in the water.

The drone can deploy payloads in flight, so a flotation device could be dropped to someone cut off by floods to keep them safe until rescue personnel reach them

Fritch said the overriding priority for all operations is safety, as the operating environment can be complex – law enforcement personnel, emergency services personnel, DPS helicopters, the general public, controlled airspace and the local terrain all have to be considered. This safety culture is instilled in all remote pilots during their extensive in-house training program. Additionally, all remote pilots for TXDPS must have obtained their Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) Part 107 certificate prior to beginning flight training in the program to ensure their thorough understanding of FAA rules and regulations, airspace, and weather.

Calgary Police Service

North of the border in Canada, the Calgary Police Service (CPS) started using remotely piloted aircraft systems (RPAS) in 2015 for collision reconstruction in the Traffic Section. Since then, they have also been used for outdoor crime scene photography, area mapping, overwatch for tactical unit members, ensuring the safety of the public and police in situations with armed persons, a few searches, both for people and evidence, and creative applications.

Constable Kevin Spear, Interim RPAS Coordinator and lead instructor, said: “At the time, we used a pair of DJI Phantom 2 Vision+ aircraft. We had eight police officers trained as pilots. In 2020, along with an update to the Canadian Aviation Regulations, we expanded the program to include the Tactical Unit in our Support Section and the Digital Services Section, which is a civilian unit that creates promotional material and training videos, amongst other things. We maintained eight police pilots in Traffic, added six police pilots in the Tactical Unit and two civilian pilots (existing members, not new hires) in Digital Services.”

Since then, another eight police pilots have been trained in the Tactical Unit and two more civilian pilots have been trained in Digital Services. Additional police pilots have been trained in other areas of the organization but they are not yet operational. In total, there are 42 trained pilots, with plans to add to that number this year. Pilot education and training is done internally and follows the guidelines set out by Transport Canada.

The current fleet of is mostly DJI products, various iterations of the Mavic 2 platform for the most part. There are currently no fixed-wing aircraft in the fleet. In addition, a pair of Sky-Hero Loki MkII small tactical quadcopters are used by the Tactical Unit. These are designed to place a microphone and a camera in dark, indoor environments and GPS-denied areas. CPS also has a pair of Airbus H125 helicopters in its Helicopter Air Watch for Community Safety (HAWCS) unit, which are equipped with camera/forward-looking infrared (FLIR) systems.

Sergeant Dallas Grimm of the District 1 Mountain Bike Team 110 and UAV/RPAS subject matter expert and enforcement coordinator works on enforcement, administration, policy/procedure and outside agency relations such as Transport Canada, Nav Canada and the Calgary Airport Authority. He said: “One thing that we do differently from other agencies is to have created an entire part of the program focused on enforcement and education with the public. We work very closely with our governing body, Transport Canada, which has enabled us to build one of the only robust and court-tested enforcement programs.”

He added that the unit began to explore the use of drones for protests, including anti-vaccine rallies and protests outside the 2023 World Petroleum Congress in Calgary, but none of the events had anything out of the ordinary happening. However, it will be expanding operations to include major event overwatch and cross-training between units. This will include trained police pilots who can respond to major events in a public safety capacity to monitor crowds and other emergencies.

West Midlands Police

In the UK, every police force except two is known to use drones. One of the users is the West Midlands Police (WMP). West Midlands is the second most populous county in England after Greater London and includes the large city of Birmingham.

Police Constable Chris Turton, Drone Unit Officer and Chief Pilot in WMP’s Operations division, said that drone operations started in 2015 as a feasibility study into their potential application in police work. When it was decided to proceed in 2017, there were considerable efforts to engage with the general public, to highlight the legitimacy of drone use within policing and that they wouldn’t be used for ‘spying’, especially as the drones could not be made clearly identifiable as belonging to the police. Today, the Drone Unit have marked police vehicles and wear high-visibility clothing to make their presence obvious.
 

The Drone Unit is deployed to help officers scan large areas in a very short time, as well as filming crime scenes, and providing live feeds direct from major incidents or events

To fund the project, WMP applied for funds from the Proceeds of Crime Act – cash raised from assets seized from criminals convicted in court. During the initial few years, this paid for almost all the drones and pilot training.

The current fleet of 16 drones includes three large DJI Matrice 300 RTKs, three DJI M30Ts, four DJI Mavic 2 Enterprise Advanceds, two DJI Avatas (for internal searches) and two Autel EVO Max 4Ts. Two DJI Mavic 3Ts are being phased out. A number of other drones are also used by other WMP departments for their own purposes.

Turton explained that the drones previously came under the Force Support Unit but this was restructured in 2023, with the Drone Unit becoming a dedicated department under Operations. It also resulted in a slight downsizing. Instead of two to three cars on duty per shift, it is now one to two cars, each carrying three to four drones. This also means that, between 2022 and 2023, flights dropped from 5,143 to 4,668 and flying hours from 1,177 to 1,085. There are 20 pilots, with a contingency team of 11 pilots who were transferred to other duties in the reshuffle.

The Drone Unit is deployed to help officers scan large areas in a very short time, as well as filming crime scenes, and providing live feeds direct from major incidents or large sports events and protests. In addition, they are used to hunt for suspects in large, hard-to-reach areas like parkland, canal and tow paths, and in missing person searches. Typical missions last about 15 minutes but having several drones in the car means deployment periods can be extended if necessary.

As already noted, many UK police forces now use drones and there was a consensus between them that the easiest way to introduce some kind of standard was to become commercial operators under the authority of the UK Civil Aviation Authority (CAA). This defines the training requirements but also the operational parameters, such as a maximum height of 400ft. WMP can call on an Airbus H135 helicopter from the National Police Air Service base at Birmingham Airport, but if the two are at the same scene, the helicopter stays above 500ft. Simple radio communications are used if a Midlands Air Ambulance helicopter may need to land close to the drone operating area. This also applies if operating close to the airport. 
 
*The TXDPS does not endorse any of the products mentioned within this article.