Search and Rescue using Drones

I’ve been a drone pilot for 3 years with a decently sized video library, I’ve flown pretty close to every week for the past couple of years, and in a variety of terrain; Rivers, canyons, mountains, slot canyons, lakes, desert.

With a steady flow of stories regarding Search and Rescue calls, including some tragic deaths, we could agree that the faster the victim is located, the better.

Here’s a situation similar to a recent SAR story, a victim has not returned from their hike through a slot canyon or a forest. After the walking of likely paths and contact strategies have been exhausted on foot, the next call is usually the helicopter. Think about what it takes to prepare the helicopter for a Search and Rescue run, and why it is so expensive.

First, does the situation justify using this expensive equipment? How much time is lost, debating if this is important enough to call the helicopter? Then, how much time is needed to prepare the helicopter, and then fly it to the location, and then possibly land with the SAR crew on the ground for mission briefing, and then launching again for the first search attempt? How many crew are needed to physically be in the helicopter, how long does it take to bring them in then fly them to the mission site? Finally, how close can they get? If the victim is in a canyon, the pilot will still need hundreds of feet horizontal clearance because of possible wind and thermal gusts. So the helicopter still may not have great visibility.

And then that price tag.

This is where drones will start making an impact for Search and Rescue. Imagine a single drone pilot (like myself) is already in the area with their drone on a casual hike. My current model can fly over 2 miles away from my controller, while still streaming live HD video back to my tablet, with GPS tracks to show the areas flown, and the witnesses can point on the map where the victim was last seen.

There are some definite limits of the average consumer drone vs the helicopter, for sure. They won’t get the range or the flight time, but they’ll be ready to fly in 2 minutes. The drone will need some good connection between the controller and drone, and will only be able to fly a distance of a few miles away from the controller, but this could be a likely perimeter. The whole operation could be free of charge too, most drone pilots are just eager to fly and lend a helping hand. The drone can get much closer to the victim, in tighter spaces than the helicopter. Once the victim is located, the GPS marker can be set and the rescue is underway. The helicopter may be needed still for extraction, but now they can fly straight there instead of burning valuable time searching.

I’d be interested to hear your thoughts about using drones more for Search and Rescue. Are there some disadvantages? Sure. But are there a multitude of advantages including time and readiness, price, and personnel.

Have you been involved with a Search and Rescue? Would you provide some insight to this topic?