Rise of the Drones

As technology advances, unmanned aircraft used for surveillance are moving from the battlefield to your backyard, and not everyone is happy with it (with poll)

 

In Pakistan, since 2004, from under 2,000 at the low end to more than 3,400. The CIA isn't saying. So who's being killed -- terrorists or civilians?

 

"The data show that only a relatively small number of high-level targets have been killed, something on the order of 50, estimates vary. which is roughly 2 percent of those who have been killed," said James Cavallaro, a law professor at Stanford University. "Which means that 98 percent of those killed have not been high-level targets."

 

Cavallaro is co-author of a paper critical of U.S. drone use. He and his team went to Pakistan.

 

"We don't hear enough about the costs, civilians killed, civilians injured, destruction of communities, growth of anti-Americanism, and fomenting recruitment for terrorist groups," he told Teichner. "When all of that is considered, there are serious doubts about whether drones are the best option. (...)

 

Now, drones are headed off the battlefield. They're already coming your way.

 

AeroVironment, the California company that sells the military something like 85 percent of its fleet, is marketing them now to public safety agencies.

 

Steve Gitlin, a vice-president of AeroVironment, demonstrated for Teicher the company's Qube system: "It's a small unmanned aircraft that's designed to give first responders an immediate eye in the sky so they can find lost kids, they can investigate accidents, they can support disaster recovery for earthquakes in California, tornadoes in the Midwest, hurricanes in the Gulf Coast.

 

To assist in this type of important mission, the SMASH project is exploring a combination of effective software design practices, artificial intelligence, and inexpensive hardware. These capabilities will allow one responder to control a fleet of quadcopters  or other robotic vehicles that search the rubble (for example, using thermal sensors, ground-penetrating radar, and other types of sensor payloads) and present the results to a smartphone or other human-computer device in a manner that’s useful and efficient to human operators, as shown in Figure 2.

Matternet has a vision of creating a network of autonomous flying drones that can deliver medical and other vital supplies to regions that either do not have access to such things, or find getting them tough. The drone network would serve areas with no serviceable road access, or places that have been devastated by natural disasters or war.

Jeff Braun's Emergency Management blog shares an article first published in Governing magazine, and then later in Emergency Management magazine. Written by Eli Richman, and published by Emergency Management on November 30, 2012, the article provides an overview of the use of drones by emergency responders in the United States. It is becoming apparent that unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), or drones, can assist law enforcement agencies in a variety of activities. As pointed out in the article, perhaps it could be helpful in finding a lost hiker in a national forest. Closer to home, perhaps a drone could have been used a few years ago when local responders attempted to find a missing kayaker lost on a stream in Fort Bend County?

Fire first responders could use such a tool also; perhaps for getting a birds-eye view of a hazardous materials incident or major fire. Think about how valuable the use of such equipment might be as hundreds of responders attempt to fight a raging wildfire in close proximity to a subdivision. Emergency managers could use an unmanned aerial vehicle for conducting damage assessments after a hurricane. It would seem to be an efficient way of getting needed information without putting responder lives at risk. As a matter of fact, it has recently become known that NASA is readying a couple of experimental UAVs to track future storms. Why? To assist communities in preparing for the storms.

For more information on NASA’s use of drones.