Police, fire, and search-and-rescue teams putting drones to work when minutes matter.
The Alaska Division of Forestry and Fire Protection (DFFP) used its Unmanned Aerial Systems Module to identify hot spots and spot fires across the Gerstle River during the Sawmill Creek Fire, helping ground crews achieve 100 percent containment four days after ignition. The fire was held to 14.8 acres on state land east of Delta…
A Durham Regional Police Service (DRPS) drone operator located a suspect with outstanding warrants for violent offences in under 20 minutes on May 9, 2026, after the man fled a disturbance call in Pickering, Ontario and hid in a green space. The operation marks one of the first publicly documented arrests powered by DRPS’s three-month-old…
The Coconino County Sheriff’s Office in Flagstaff, Arizona is using the latest AI-capable Skydio drones with the LOC8 G2 image-analysis platform to compress search and rescue photo review from thousands of drone images down to about twenty per mission. The agency also works with a Scotland-based company to build environment-specific AI models for Northern Arizona…
The Dallas Police Department officially launched its Drone as First Responder program on Wednesday, May 20, 2026, deploying eight remotely piloted Skydio aircraft from Dallas Fire-Rescue stations across the city. Each drone covers a two-mile radius from its base, with operators working from the department’s Fusion/Real Time Crime Center. The first operational deployment landed the…
A police drone operator with Nottinghamshire Police located a stolen telehandler hidden under trees near the A46 on May 20, 2026, using a DJI Matrice 300 RTK, five days after the bright-yellow machine had been reported missing from Hawton near Newark on Friday, May 15. Photos from the scene confirm the airframe. The recovered telehandler…
Vanderbilt University Public Safety has launched a drone first-responder program for its Nashville campus, with installation and personnel training completed in April 2026 and initial operations conducted during Commencement week. The fleet is built on Skydio X10 platforms, equipped with high-resolution cameras, thermal imaging, and a parachute recovery system. According to the university, a drone
Welcome to your weekly UAS News Update. I have three stories for you this week: Autel is fighting back against the FCC’s Covered List, the Michigan House passed two drone procurement bills while stalling on airspace restrictions, and a drones-for-good story where a thermal drone saved a life in freezing temperatures. Let’s get to it.…
DJI says Ontario's Chinese drone ban is a country-of-origin decision without evidence, citing seven years of audits and warning of public safety costs.
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