Bee Cave, Texas: Starting An Autonomous Drone First Responder Program
19 September, 2024- Bee Cave, Texas, is a small suburb of Austin. It aspires to become the initial capital in the nation. The city intends to implement a drone autonomy program. This program is for its police department. This program uses drones as first responders.
The city anticipates launching a prototype DFR program soon. They will start with a single drone. The Austin-based startup eve Vehicles created this UAV. The city plans to expand the system. At some point it will include three quadcopter UAV. It will also include three drone bases and related equipment. Eve will build these using American-made components.
Law enforcement agencies across the country are experiencing manpower shortages. This situation offers a chance to leverage technology. We can use technology to deliver a more efficient law enforcement service.
The system will work with the 9-1-1 emergency system. Drones will be dispatched as the police department’s initial response to events. The UAVs will provide aerial support at the scene of a traffic accident or wildfire. They will also respond to reports of a suspicious person or someone with a gun.
The UAVs are being built entirely by Eve Vehicles, according to Jones. He expects the first drone to start responding to 9-1-1 calls by mid-September. The rest of the system should be operational within the next several months.
They have built the first drone. Once they make all the necessary modifications, they will replicate it. They will create two more drones.
Eve Vehicles founded in 2021. With the University of Texas at Austin, they established an early alliance. Bee Cave, a city, and Eve Vehicles have partnered together. The police department will serve as the alpha test. This is for the company’s technology. CEO Roger Pecina stated this.
At first, the system will use one UAV. This drone will operate from the Bee Cave police station. Every flight will be monitored by a ground observer. Later on, the company will get an FAA certificate of authorization (COA). This will allow it to beyond visual line-of-sight missions. At that point, missions can be run independently by the DFR system. This is according to Pecina.
The DFR technology is being tested by the business at Bee Cave. It plans to market this system to other municipal governments. The city will get donations of UAVs and associated equipment from the corporation. In the first year, it will operate the system for a nominal fee of $1.
They plan to grow it at some point, but we are the first agency to use it. Eve will implement the system and put it into full operation. The city will then share the data it collects with the company.
Under the proposed program, a 9-1-1 call will come in. If the call merits a DFR response, a police department pilot will take command. The pilot will program the location of the incident into the system. According to Jones, the drone will then on their launch and glide to the site. The drone will start sending footage of the scene back to its base as soon as it gets there.
The video feed will be available to the officer who requested it. It will also be accessible to any authorized officers. The call’s aerial footage will be available to the dispatcher. This will happen before the officers arrive.
A full charge lasts 40 to 45 minutes for the UAV. It will linger as close to the situation as is necessary. It will stay there until someone resolves the situation.
The drones will converse with one another throughout a protracted call. The UAV that is running low on battery will signal the other UAV for assistance. From its nesting location, the second UAV will launch itself. It will take the place of the initial unmanned aircraft sent to the location. As a result, the initial drone can return to its base and get fresh batteries.
Drone: System To Protect Residents’ Privacy
Jones said the system protects privacy. It will safeguard the privacy of community members. The drones will travel along specific paths. These pathways will direct the drones to avoid flying over residential areas. The vehicles’ cameras have 80X optical zoom capabilities. The drones can take sharp pictures as a result of this. They can do this without hovering above an incident scene. This statement comes from Jones.
In the case of 9-1-1 calls from a community, we will program the drones to avoid recording nearby residents. This applies to the town of 10,000 people. The goal is to prevent unnecessary recordings of their activities.
If the call comes from a where they live, they don’t have to be sitting over that house. If the call is about an incident at a home, the drone will not record video footage. It will not record community members. It will only record whether they are at that specific property.
After the incident, the Bee Cave PD will decide if the video footage has evidentiary value. They will assess it in the same manner as body cam and dash cam footage. If the video has no evidential value, the department will remove it within 30 days.
Drone: System To Improve Law Enforcement Response
This program included two FAA-certified pilots. It also had a fleet of five DJI drones: an M-30T, a Phantom 4 Pro, a Mavic Pro, and two Avatas. Jones said Eve first contacted the city about establishing a DFR program. This was partly due to the town’s proximity to the company’s headquarters. Ten square miles make up the city’s area. It was the perfect place to test the eve system because of its size and population.
Pecina said the drone system complies with the National Defense Authorization Act. We will build the drones in America. They will use American-made components. This includes the flight controller, electronic speed controller, telecommunications system, and battery. The only Chinese-made component is the motor. T-MOTOR of Nanchang, China produces it. But Pecina intends to rectify the situation shortly.
We have sourced an American motor manufacturer to replace our motors. But we have yet to make the switch. We get a bit more efficiency from our T-MOTOR setup.
He said law enforcement agencies are demanding American-made drone products. This demand is particularly strong due to proposed congressional bans on Chinese-produced drones.
We have received a lot of interest in developing the NDAA solution. But I am confident that the most attention will come once the ban goes into effect. By this juncture, you will be unable to buy DJI drones for safety activities.
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