Latest / Blue Grit Podcast: The Voice of Texas Law Enforcement / #025- "Eyes In The Sky" with Pearland Police

Transcript

#025- "Eyes In The Sky" with Pearland Police · Blue Grit Podcast: The Voice of Texas Law Enforcement

0:00
SPEAKER_03: Call for service populates.
0:01
SPEAKER_03: Uh they hit go.
0:02
SPEAKER_03: If they click go to that call for service, the drone will automatically do its thing.
0:06
SPEAKER_03: For those who don't know what a drone is first responder program is, that's where a 911 call for service drops, and then uh a drone that is pre-positioned throughout the city or county uh automatically launches and flies to the scene streaming the live feed to responding personnel.
0:24
SPEAKER_08: Hey everybody, it's Blue Grit Podcast.
0:26
SPEAKER_08: We are back this week, Clint McNear and Tyler Owen.
0:30
SPEAKER_08: Tyler Owen, and we got Natalie, the rock star behind the camera, keeping us all in line today.
0:35
SPEAKER_08: Cool episode.
0:37
SPEAKER_08: Um a lot of technology, a lot of cool stuff gonna be discussed on this episode too.
0:43
SPEAKER_08: TO TOLC's WHAT TO DO Herbert Ubre.
0:46
SPEAKER_06: Hope I said that correctly.
0:48
SPEAKER_06: And Brandon Carr, former Paraland PD, now with drone sense, and Ubre is with uh Paraland currently.
0:55
SPEAKER_06: Took a class with him last week.
0:56
SPEAKER_06: I've sad to say I I don't think the outcome of the test was was was too great, but uh I'm I'm hoping I can I can retake that later on.
1:04
SPEAKER_06: But uh no, I took a test with uh with Parland.
1:07
SPEAKER_06: I was fortunate to uh attend a drone class down in Paraland a couple weeks ago.
1:12
SPEAKER_06: And uh man, it got an interesting stuff going on there at uh at Paraland.
1:17
SPEAKER_06: And you got some uh some pretty cool stuff as far as with drone and response.
1:21
SPEAKER_06: And I called Clint immediately afterwards and said, man, we've got to have these guys on, gotta have them on because uh I think this is the future of law enforcement.
1:30
SPEAKER_06: Uh and so wanted to bring you guys on and talk about what you guys got going on and uh really just your involvement with drones and uh you know y'all's involvement with stuff.
1:38
SPEAKER_06: So welcome on the the blue grip stage.
1:41
SPEAKER_06: So thank you.
1:41
SPEAKER_06: Yeah, yeah.
1:42
SPEAKER_06: So before we dive off into or delve, dive or delve Clint.
1:46
SPEAKER_06: We're delving.
1:47
SPEAKER_06: We're delving today.
1:48
SPEAKER_08: We dove last week, we're delving this week.
1:49
SPEAKER_06: All right.
1:49
SPEAKER_06: Uh I know that you're former Paraland PD, now you're a drone sense, but uh let's talk about how y'all gotten into uh into law enforcement and kind of what started your law enforcement career, and then we'll we'll delve into the uh into the drones.
2:02
SPEAKER_06: So, Brandon?
2:04
SPEAKER_03: Definitely started out with that.
2:05
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
2:06
SPEAKER_03: Uh so I got into law enforcement uh a little bit after I got out of the manned aviation side of the house.
2:10
SPEAKER_03: So um before I became a cop, I was wanting to get in with the airlines, became a certified flight instructor for manned aviation.
2:16
SPEAKER_06: Well, that makes a whole lot of sense.
2:17
SPEAKER_06: Yeah, did not know that.
2:18
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
2:19
SPEAKER_06: So taking that class, I'm sure that that helped out a lot.
2:22
SPEAKER_03: You got it.
2:22
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, so I already knew a little bit about drones, so that's where it helped us get to where we are today.
2:27
SPEAKER_03: But um the career in manned aviation didn't quite pan out.
2:31
SPEAKER_03: Uh, whenever I was getting deep into that, is when Continental went under.
2:34
SPEAKER_03: Uh they furled all their pilots.
2:35
SPEAKER_03: There's a million flight instructors for every student.
2:38
SPEAKER_03: And so uh what we ended up doing is um I ended up getting out of that and getting into the next thing that I was really interested in, which was law enforcement.
2:47
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
2:47
SPEAKER_03: And so um applied at I I did what I wasn't supposed to, and I applied at like 20 different agencies, right?
2:53
SPEAKER_03: I didn't know that you weren't supposed to do that.
2:54
SPEAKER_03: No, yeah.
2:55
SPEAKER_03: Uh so my background investigators loved me.
2:57
SPEAKER_03: But um, yeah, so I put in for Paraland.
3:00
SPEAKER_03: I was fortunate enough to get picked up by Paraland, uh, started my career there.
3:04
SPEAKER_03: Uh, worked for Paraland for a little over nine years.
3:06
SPEAKER_03: Uber was one of my FDOs and evaluators, uh, so that was entertaining.
3:10
SPEAKER_03: Um, but it uh it built the relationship that we have today.
3:14
SPEAKER_03: I mean, we we we worked very closely together, even still, even with me not working in Pareland anymore, close friends.
3:19
SPEAKER_06: Now, were you from the Houston area?
3:21
SPEAKER_03: I am so I grew up in uh the the Magnolia area.
3:23
SPEAKER_03: Okay.
3:24
SPEAKER_06: So for those that don't know, Continental was is based out of Houston.
3:27
SPEAKER_03: Right.
3:27
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
3:27
SPEAKER_06: Okay.
3:28
SPEAKER_06: And that were you just solely focused on Continental?
3:30
SPEAKER_06: Was that just solely?
3:31
SPEAKER_03: No, uh I wanted to fly a corporate.
3:33
SPEAKER_03: Uh but whenever I was trying to get all my hours up to be able to go be uh a regional pilot or a corporate pilot, uh, you have to have so many hours of flight time.
3:41
SPEAKER_03: And easy way to do that is to be an instructor.
3:44
SPEAKER_03: And well, there weren't any students because there were so many flight instructors.
3:48
SPEAKER_03: Okay.
3:49
SPEAKER_03: And so um I maintained my currencies for a little while and and that just wasn't pinning out, it just got too expensive.
3:54
SPEAKER_03: Um, and so I said, all right, well, let's do the next best thing.
3:57
SPEAKER_03: That's gonna be law enforcement.
3:58
SPEAKER_03: So put in for agencies all over Texas.
4:02
SPEAKER_03: Um, did a whole lot of overboards, a whole lot of PT, a whole lot of lie detector desk.
4:06
SPEAKER_03: Fun times.
4:07
SPEAKER_03: Um, don't miss that at all.
4:09
SPEAKER_03: But uh, like I said, I got real fortune to be picked up in Paraland.
4:13
SPEAKER_03: Um, loved every minute in them.
4:14
SPEAKER_03: Air Paraland's a great agency to work for.
4:16
SPEAKER_03: Uh wouldn't have missed nothing, barely miss it.
4:19
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
4:20
SPEAKER_06: Yeah.
4:20
SPEAKER_06: Oh, it seems like a really good agency.
4:22
SPEAKER_06: And everybody, everybody was there uh or or that I interacted with were super you know supportive.
4:26
SPEAKER_06: We've all been at that agency where it's like they had that that that stare where nobody's you know, they don't want to really interact with everybody.
4:33
SPEAKER_06: Yeah, exactly.
4:33
SPEAKER_06: But everybody was super interacting, and it might have something to do with that, you know.
4:36
SPEAKER_06: I am with TMPA and I was a guest in the house, but for the most part, you could tell that everybody was happy and you know interacting.
4:42
SPEAKER_06: Uh, but I was there for just a couple days.
4:45
SPEAKER_06: But anyway, so you had him during FTO.
4:47
SPEAKER_06: You had this guy.
4:48
SPEAKER_04: I did.
4:49
SPEAKER_04: Yeah, yeah.
4:51
SPEAKER_04: Oh, it says Ghostface.
4:52
SPEAKER_04: Tell us the story.
4:53
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, I was a guy.
4:54
SPEAKER_03: It was my uh he was my ghost phase evaluator, and he was obnoxious.
5:00
SPEAKER_03: So because I had zero feedback, so like I was an evaluator, I was an FTO for years as well.
5:05
SPEAKER_03: Uh I learned what Uber did and was like, I'm not gonna do that.
5:08
SPEAKER_03: Um you learned from him what not to do.
5:10
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
5:12
SPEAKER_03: No, I mean he's one of our most distinguished FTOs we have.
5:14
SPEAKER_03: Um, but I mean I learned a ton from him, even with being ghost phase, and but what was obnoxious about it was he would provide absolutely zero feedback.
5:22
SPEAKER_03: Like he was literally a ghost the entire time.
5:25
SPEAKER_03: Like I'd be driving around and he'd just be sitting there doing his thing, and then he'd look over at me, write some notes, and then we'd keep on going, right?
5:34
SPEAKER_01: It's ghostface.
5:36
SPEAKER_07: No feedback whatsoever.
5:37
SPEAKER_07: Are those good notes or bad notes, sir?
5:39
SPEAKER_03: Well, they I mean I passed.
5:41
SPEAKER_03: So I guess they were semi-good notes mostly.
5:44
SPEAKER_03: Um, but yeah, like he just no feedback whatsoever the entire time.
5:48
SPEAKER_03: And that's so that was frustrating for me as I was going through FTO, you know, you're constantly getting people, right?
5:53
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, yeah.
5:54
SPEAKER_03: And so instead I just see him doing this the whole time.
5:57
SPEAKER_03: And I mean, even whenever we got a burglary alarm call, uh, and I went up and on the map the roads connect, but in the real world, the roads don't connect.
6:04
SPEAKER_03: And so he I started going and he realized what I was doing because he knew that that happened.
6:08
SPEAKER_03: So the whole time we're getting there, and as we get closer and closer, I just see his big old grin getting bigger and bigger.
6:13
SPEAKER_03: And uh we get there and he's like, Went the wrong way, huh?
6:16
SPEAKER_03: I was like, Yeah.
6:17
SPEAKER_03: He's like, All right, well, let's get there.
6:18
SPEAKER_03: So I had to drive all the way back around.
6:19
SPEAKER_03: I was like, You knew that?
6:20
SPEAKER_03: He's like, Oh yeah.
6:24
SPEAKER_03: But uh yeah, no, I mean I've learned a lot over from from Moobri over the years.
6:28
SPEAKER_03: Uh he helped shape a lot of the way that I did policing.
6:31
SPEAKER_03: Uh, he was always somebody I could always turn to for any type of advice, or uh whether it was whether I got in trouble or if I had uh uh any type of uh investigation I had ongoing on how I could put potentially do it better.
6:43
SPEAKER_03: So he was uh he was a great resource for me uh going through the the my entire career as a law enforcement officer.
6:48
SPEAKER_03: That's cool.
6:48
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, it's cool.
6:50
SPEAKER_03: He's not bad.
6:51
SPEAKER_08: Did Joe look like twins when you trained him?
6:53
SPEAKER_04: Or this is why we cut our heads.
6:56
SPEAKER_04: Uh kind of developed over time.
6:59
SPEAKER_06: The stress of being an FTO will do it to you.
7:01
SPEAKER_06: I'm sure.
7:02
SPEAKER_06: So how long have you been with Paraland?
7:04
SPEAKER_04: Uh since 2008.
7:06
SPEAKER_06: Oh wow.
7:06
SPEAKER_04: A little while.
7:07
SPEAKER_04: 15 years today.
7:08
SPEAKER_04: Uh this month will be 15 years.
7:09
SPEAKER_08: Did you grow up in the area down there?
7:11
SPEAKER_04: Uh I grew up uh South Houston area, um just south of Houston.
7:14
SPEAKER_04: Uh family is all law enforcement or fire.
7:17
SPEAKER_04: Um tried the fire academy, wasn't for me.
7:20
SPEAKER_06: Uh you didn't like sleeping and all the time.
7:21
SPEAKER_06: You didn't like dating video games and a lot of boredom in the fire department.
7:25
SPEAKER_04: So uh I'm joking, I'm joking, fireman.
7:28
SPEAKER_06: Don't get upset.
7:28
SPEAKER_06: I don't want to get any hate mail at Blue Grit.
7:30
SPEAKER_06: Yeah, sorry.
7:31
SPEAKER_04: So I decided to carry a gun instead.
7:33
SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
7:33
SPEAKER_04: Um went to the academy.
7:34
SPEAKER_04: I went work Harris County Sheriff's Department first.
7:37
SPEAKER_04: Uh, I was a detention officer for them for about a year and a half.
7:40
SPEAKER_04: Um they came over to Paraland.
7:41
SPEAKER_04: They put me through the academy.
7:43
SPEAKER_04: Um, been on the streets ever since.
7:45
SPEAKER_04: I work patrol.
7:46
SPEAKER_04: I've only worked patrol.
7:47
SPEAKER_04: Um that's where I'm focused at.
7:49
SPEAKER_06: Now, did you have some experience?
7:51
SPEAKER_06: You you were patrol, but I thought I heard you correctly when you were can there were you were canine?
7:55
SPEAKER_04: I was canine for about a year.
7:57
SPEAKER_06: And then you had also tactical experience?
7:59
SPEAKER_04: Uh so no tactical experience.
8:02
SPEAKER_04: Um in the last year I've been attached to our SWAT team as the pilot for the SWAT team.
8:07
SPEAKER_06: Okay, but maybe when you were canine, you may have deployed your dog with the canine with the TAC unit.
8:14
SPEAKER_04: Oh, when I was in canine, we were uh single purpose dogs.
8:16
SPEAKER_06: Okay, so no tactical no.
8:20
SPEAKER_06: So over time, um you've obviously got a ton of experience with patrol.
8:24
SPEAKER_06: Paraland is a very active city.
8:25
SPEAKER_06: For those that don't know, it's on the south side of Houston.
8:27
SPEAKER_06: It's a fairly large agency, very well respected agency.
8:30
SPEAKER_06: We've got a couple board members there.
8:32
SPEAKER_06: Uh and I'm not just saying that because they're on the board.
8:34
SPEAKER_06: Shout out to John Dispayne and Tommy Landis.
8:37
SPEAKER_06: Uh, but again, it's a it's a pretty big size, you know, agency.
8:41
SPEAKER_06: Uh how many sworn?
8:42
SPEAKER_06: I think we're right at 200, just over two now.
8:45
SPEAKER_04: We're at 170, I believe, right now.
8:48
SPEAKER_06: Yeah, yeah.
8:48
SPEAKER_06: Pretty big, pretty big department.
8:50
SPEAKER_06: So how did who who got who got started into the drones and how did that you're at 178 now.
8:56
SPEAKER_08: I guess in January you had 179.
8:58
SPEAKER_08: Yeah.
8:58
SPEAKER_08: Thanks, Brandon.
8:59
SPEAKER_08: Thanks, Brandon.
9:00
SPEAKER_08: My bad.
9:01
SPEAKER_08: Appreciate that, anybody.
9:04
SPEAKER_03: Um yeah, so uh back in Thanksgiving of 2017, we had an autistic juvenile go missing.
9:10
SPEAKER_03: Uh it was a massive search event.
9:12
SPEAKER_03: We had Texas Equisearch out there, we had Coast Guard integrated, we had all the neighboring agencies that could spare officers, we had um all of the community looking for this autistic juvenile.
9:22
SPEAKER_03: I was even on uh FMLA during that time.
9:24
SPEAKER_03: I was coming off of a surgery, and even me and my wife hopped in a car and we're driving around uh trying to find this uh this autistic juvenile.
9:31
SPEAKER_03: And um, unfortunately, that did not end the way that everybody was hoping.
9:36
SPEAKER_03: Um he he ended up finding a uh uh pond on on property.
9:40
SPEAKER_03: Um and at that time, uh a lieutenant at the time ended up writing a proposal to Chief saying, Hey, there's these things called drones.
9:48
SPEAKER_03: And uh had we had drones, we potentially believe we could have either saved that child's life or brought closure sooner than we did.
9:56
SPEAKER_03: Um and one late night when I was trying to just stay awake on night patrol, I was going through all the different proposals and I found the drone proposal.
10:04
SPEAKER_03: And I said, Well, hey, I got FAA background, I know a little bit about drones from playing Call of Duty, uh, maybe I can make this happen, right?
10:12
SPEAKER_03: And so um I asked if I could run with the proposal and see if I can build this out, and Chief said yes.
10:18
SPEAKER_03: Uh and so me being the overly persistent individual that I am uh was able to build that out.
10:24
SPEAKER_03: Um we also were super fortunate that uh my city had already purchased drones.
10:30
SPEAKER_03: Um but drones are not just the toys that a lot of people think they are.
10:34
SPEAKER_03: Um the city was not able to get those drones to actually fly just because of updates and the challenges of those systems.
10:40
SPEAKER_03: They bought one of the most complex platforms that were on the market at the time.
10:44
SPEAKER_03: Um and so I asked, I was like, well, if I can get this to fly, can Parallel and PD use it?
10:49
SPEAKER_03: And they said, well, yeah, good good luck.
10:51
SPEAKER_03: And I said, Great.
10:52
SPEAKER_03: And so I started doing some research.
10:55
SPEAKER_03: Um I got into some Facebook groups that are um have what I would consider the big subject matter experts, uh, worldwide subject matter experts, uh, and they took me under their wing, they helped me get these drones flying, they educated me on everything that I know today.
11:09
SPEAKER_06: So, real quick, we're talking about 2017.
11:11
SPEAKER_06: I'm trying to think back in my law enforcement career where where I was at.
11:15
SPEAKER_06: The drones and law enforcement was not a real big thing at that point.
11:20
SPEAKER_06: So you're talking how many agencies in Texas at that point or are at that point in time do you remember?
11:25
SPEAKER_03: Real few.
11:25
SPEAKER_03: Uh I know Texas DPS was utilizing drones a little bit.
11:29
SPEAKER_06: Um I can't think of any.
11:31
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, no, Austin Fire, uh their red team had started one.
11:33
SPEAKER_03: Cloy Kessler started a drone program, and he's one of the first people I reached out to.
11:36
SPEAKER_06: Maybe a couple handful in California.
11:38
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, it very little amount of agents, some, but very, very little.
11:42
SPEAKER_06: So for the most part, law enforcement in Texas, we rely only on air support.
11:47
SPEAKER_06: Right.
11:47
SPEAKER_06: That's it.
11:47
SPEAKER_06: So when y'all needed air support, you would have to rely on DPS, which Houston.
11:52
SPEAKER_04: Yeah, we call it Houston Fox most.
11:53
SPEAKER_06: And that was it.
11:54
SPEAKER_06: So you're literally talking about pioneering something thinking outside the box, yes, which I think's pretty badass.
12:01
SPEAKER_03: It was fun.
12:02
SPEAKER_03: I mean, there were there's some there's a lot of lessons learned.
12:04
SPEAKER_03: Oh, yeah.
12:05
SPEAKER_03: A lot of lessons learned.
12:06
unknown: Yeah.
12:06
SPEAKER_06: And this is in Paralan.
12:09
SPEAKER_06: Yeah.
12:09
SPEAKER_06: So Houston PD probably wasn't even probably the because they had their they had their ear unit.
12:13
SPEAKER_03: They do.
12:14
SPEAKER_03: They're just now program off the ground.
12:16
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
12:17
SPEAKER_06: Okay.
12:18
SPEAKER_03: Go ahead.
12:18
SPEAKER_03: Uh so we were able to uh get access to those drones.
12:22
SPEAKER_03: Uh I went and took a couple of classes and got my feet wet a little bit on some things and that I needed some training on on gaps I couldn't quite figure out.
12:30
SPEAKER_03: Um, and then we just grabbed one of the cheaper drones and we went into our gym and we flew them around to try to see what they could do.
12:37
SPEAKER_03: Um and we learned a lot about that.
12:39
SPEAKER_03: We learned that don't turn the lights off uh when the drones are flying because it'll want to crash.
12:43
SPEAKER_03: Uh I learned about the how to turn the motors off mid-flight on accident.
12:47
SPEAKER_03: Um so a lot of lessons learned there.
12:49
SPEAKER_03: Uh but what's really great about it though is uh not a month or two later, we had our very first win.
12:54
SPEAKER_03: Uh Uber was over at my house having breakfast, and we got a call out um on a missing autistic individual who left his group home.
13:02
SPEAKER_03: Uh so they had been searching for that individual for a little over an hour.
13:05
SPEAKER_03: Uh they called us to come fly the drone.
13:06
SPEAKER_03: We got the drone out, not having any clue what we're doing at all.
13:10
SPEAKER_03: I was going through the license process.
13:12
SPEAKER_03: Um I was where you are right now.
13:13
SPEAKER_06: Oh, but but he passed eventually.
13:16
SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
13:17
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
13:18
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
13:18
SPEAKER_03: Um so we launched the drone and we ended up finding him uh after think about 30 minutes of uh searching for him.
13:24
SPEAKER_03: So we came full circle, right?
13:25
SPEAKER_03: Right?
13:25
SPEAKER_03: Initiation was an autistic individual.
13:27
SPEAKER_03: It's cool, man.
13:28
SPEAKER_03: First find was an autistic individual.
13:29
SPEAKER_08: Were y'all an official drone unit at that time, or was it just kind of uh hey, we're letting a couple of guys figure this out and play with it?
13:37
SPEAKER_08: Oh, by the way, give them a call and see if they'll come come play.
13:41
SPEAKER_04: Yeah, yeah.
13:41
SPEAKER_04: I just I just started hanging.
13:44
SPEAKER_04: We we were working together and he just started convincing me to start flying with them.
13:47
SPEAKER_04: Like I he was convincing me to go through the license process, and my shift knew that I was flying.
13:53
SPEAKER_04: And so they called me because I was I was coming in a few hours later.
13:56
SPEAKER_04: And so they called me, like, hey, can you come in now and fly this thing?
13:59
SPEAKER_04: And I was like, uh, sure, we'll give it a shot.
14:01
SPEAKER_04: I mean, we never tried it before.
14:02
SPEAKER_06: What was there even a licensing process at at that point?
14:05
SPEAKER_06: Oh, there was licensed process.
14:06
SPEAKER_04: There was 107 was still there, but it was in the early.
14:08
SPEAKER_04: Yeah, it is.
14:09
SPEAKER_04: I was I was the guy manipulating the flight controls, right?
14:11
SPEAKER_04: I I was unlicensed, he was my I got you as my RPI.
14:14
SPEAKER_08: Your PIC.
14:15
SPEAKER_08: There you go.
14:15
SPEAKER_08: Yeah.
14:16
SPEAKER_08: So from the first um child that was searched for and not located till you till that when what was that time frame?
14:26
SPEAKER_03: Uh about a year and maybe a month or so.
14:29
SPEAKER_03: About a year and maybe a month.
14:30
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, because uh because it happened in Thanksgiving.
14:33
SPEAKER_03: Uh Thanksgiving was where that child went missing.
14:36
SPEAKER_03: June 2018 is when we first started flying.
14:40
SPEAKER_03: Uh so it'd probably be right at about a year or a little over a year that that second incident happened.
14:45
SPEAKER_08: And for our listeners that haven't dealt with uh a person in the autistic community, for whatever unique, and I I'm certainly not a psychologist or psychiatrist, but there's a phenomenon with autistic people, and it seems like autistic kids specifically, when they come up missing, we feel like we're under the gun on a timeline because there's a phenomenon where they go to water and unfortunately many, many missing autistic young people and kids are found in pools, lakes, ponds, streams, creeks, which puts an extreme amount of time sensitivity on on you know, people on horseback, or if you can get an aircraft air unit up, I mean it it's literally a matter of probably saving a life.
15:36
SPEAKER_03: Right.
15:36
SPEAKER_03: And that was the first thing we started looking for.
15:38
SPEAKER_03: It's like find the pools, let's hit the pools first, uh, and then we hit the ponds that were around there.
15:41
SPEAKER_03: There's three ponds uh that were around where that individual was, so we hit those first, uh, just knowing that that's generally where they gravitate to.
15:49
SPEAKER_03: Um but we ended up locating him.
15:52
SPEAKER_03: He was actually on the backside of a hill, uh, which is why ground personnel weren't able to locate him.
15:55
SPEAKER_03: Uh he was up against on the backside of a hill up against a uh basically a soundball uh for a subdivision.
16:01
SPEAKER_03: Uh so we were able to locate him and provide ground coordination so that we had a a good apprehension and got him back to the group home safely.
16:07
SPEAKER_08: So first deployment was first win.
16:09
SPEAKER_08: Yes.
16:10
SPEAKER_08: First live deployment.
16:11
SPEAKER_08: One for one.
16:12
SPEAKER_03: Hey man, that's way too yeah, that's a pretty good record right there.
16:15
SPEAKER_03: Oh yeah.
16:16
SPEAKER_03: We said we should probably quit.
16:18
SPEAKER_06: That was fun.
16:19
SPEAKER_06: Yeah.
16:19
SPEAKER_06: Let's wrap it up now.
16:21
SPEAKER_06: But I mean, honestly, for for we've all dealt with we've all he was a garland cop.
16:25
SPEAKER_06: Uh, you know, I worked for a city for for dealing with it for for for one year from start to finish.
16:32
SPEAKER_06: That's a pretty good response.
16:34
SPEAKER_04: Yes.
16:36
SPEAKER_04: It was a lot changed in one year, and we were able to break it from maybe we can do this to a reality and make it win out of the yeah.
16:42
SPEAKER_06: Yeah, within one year, that's a pretty good deployment, especially with the pairland being the size it is.
16:46
SPEAKER_06: So, I mean, kudos to you guys for doing it.
16:48
SPEAKER_06: So too.
16:49
SPEAKER_06: And then seeing what it is now.
16:50
SPEAKER_08: 2018, roughly, first deployment, first win.
16:54
SPEAKER_08: Yes.
16:54
SPEAKER_08: Yes.
16:55
SPEAKER_08: And then how did how did the unit, because you clearly it wasn't a set or official unit at that time, how's how did that begin to evolve, or what what did that look like?
17:05
SPEAKER_08: Did that help you get traction?
17:07
SPEAKER_08: Uh was it still really slow?
17:09
SPEAKER_04: Somewhat.
17:09
SPEAKER_04: So he was flying, then I started flying.
17:11
SPEAKER_04: Uh we were both on the same shift on nights.
17:14
SPEAKER_08: Personal aircraft?
17:15
SPEAKER_08: No, city owned.
17:15
SPEAKER_04: No, city owned.
17:16
SPEAKER_04: All city owned.
17:17
SPEAKER_04: Um so we were flying on our shift, and so our shift went from the shift that that was we're now the shift that has drones.
17:23
SPEAKER_04: So we go to we were just given blanket access to calls.
17:27
SPEAKER_04: Our supervisors told us if you hear a call that you think can help out with, somebody running from us, uh, somebody missing, just go.
17:33
SPEAKER_04: Don't even ask, just go.
17:35
SPEAKER_04: Um, so about two months later, we had a uh runaway go missing and we got sent.
17:42
SPEAKER_04: I went to the call, pulled up on scene.
17:44
SPEAKER_04: There's like uh it's a younger kid runaway, probably eight, nine, and so a lot of cops are showing up, and the supervisor is disregarding an officer saying, Hey, let him search the neighborhood.
17:53
SPEAKER_04: He can clear the whole neighborhood with the drone in minutes.
17:56
SPEAKER_04: It's gonna take us forever to drive every single street in the neighborhood, he can just fly across it and be done with it.
18:01
SPEAKER_04: So I don't need I don't need ten of y'all, I need like three of y'all to search the outlying areas.
18:04
SPEAKER_04: Let him search the neighborhood, y'all stay out of the neighborhood.
18:07
SPEAKER_04: And so you you immediately saw the buy-in.
18:09
SPEAKER_04: Um, and every time we would have a call where we would go over there, that that we get another little buy-in.
18:14
SPEAKER_04: Somebody else would would would say, Hey, that's pretty good, that that works really well.
18:18
SPEAKER_04: Um, and so we developed from that, and then we just started adding pilots as people get interested, right?
18:24
SPEAKER_04: It took a while, a lot of people weren't interested.
18:26
SPEAKER_04: They thought we were out there playing with toys.
18:29
SPEAKER_04: Um so we get one more pilot added, then we get one more pilot added until we eventually started a team.
18:36
SPEAKER_04: We were still assigned to patrol, but we just fly drones on the side.
18:39
SPEAKER_08: What platforms were you flying back then?
18:41
SPEAKER_03: Primarily all DJI.
18:43
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, primarily all DJI.
18:45
SPEAKER_03: DJI is the it's the largest manufacturer in the world for drones.
18:48
SPEAKER_03: Um over 95% of public safety agencies are utilizing TGI platforms.
18:54
SPEAKER_03: Um and so we were utilizing those not just because of their efficiency, but also for the cost savings.
18:59
SPEAKER_03: And I mean they're the they're by far the cheapest drone that has by far the most capability.
19:03
SPEAKER_03: And user-friendly, it seems like very police friendly.
19:07
SPEAKER_03: Oh yeah, very police friendly.
19:08
SPEAKER_03: Even firefighters can figure out the same.
19:10
SPEAKER_08: So the cost I like the cost, the platform user-friendly, I guess it's all around it, is kind of the right it's the caprice, the Chevrolet Caprice, if you will.
19:22
SPEAKER_04: Not always the prettiest, but it'll be always get the job done.
19:25
SPEAKER_07: Yeah, oh man.
19:26
SPEAKER_07: I like that shot.
19:27
SPEAKER_07: Thank you.
19:28
SPEAKER_07: Not that slide.
19:30
SPEAKER_07: Not that slide.
19:32
SPEAKER_08: So start you you two guys kind of started it out.
19:35
SPEAKER_08: What is the program staffing?
19:38
SPEAKER_08: How many pilots today, apparently?
19:40
SPEAKER_04: So we have six pilots on the team now, um, active pilots, and I have four supervisors.
19:46
SPEAKER_04: Um all of them are pilots as well.
19:48
SPEAKER_04: Um most of them don't fly as often though.
19:51
SPEAKER_04: Uh it relies on us to fly.
19:52
SPEAKER_04: So we have two uh two pilots on day shift and four pilots on night shift.
19:56
SPEAKER_08: And do you guys do like SWAT and canine?
19:58
SPEAKER_08: Do you have a designated like two-day-a month training?
20:01
SPEAKER_04: Yes, we train we train twice a month on different uh on different aspects of what we do.
20:08
SPEAKER_06: And you're all doing like I guess DGI is what y'all are doing now.
20:11
SPEAKER_06: Yes.
20:12
SPEAKER_06: That's all we have right now is DGI.
20:14
SPEAKER_06: Dan, when whenever y'all started this, and you're talking about as y'all continued to get the buy-in, was it DGI products that the city initially bought or were they outdated or were they were the first drones were outdated within uh probably three months of us starting to fly them.
20:30
SPEAKER_04: They came out with a new model and we were outdated.
20:32
SPEAKER_04: We had one drone, uh we had a uh Matrice 210, which is a large model that stayed in service for a long time.
20:38
SPEAKER_04: But our small drones that we flew on a daily basis that we were able to carry easily with us were outdated as soon as we got our first wins with them.
20:45
SPEAKER_04: And so it took a little while.
20:47
SPEAKER_04: We convinced our IT department to to buy us some new ones and we upgraded to it to some better aircraft that had thermal in them.
20:55
SPEAKER_04: And we thought we were we were going real good until we tried to fly those thermal drones at night and realized quickly that the thermal in them was not very good.
21:03
SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
21:04
SPEAKER_04: Um the first models were were pretty bad.
21:06
SPEAKER_04: Um we'd get lost in the sky because you couldn't find because you couldn't see the ground well, you had to come back down so you could navigate better again.
21:13
SPEAKER_04: So we grew from there and slowly just every they're they're worse than cell phones, they upgrade them constantly.
21:18
SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
21:19
SPEAKER_04: And then they just continue or just cease supporting the old models, and so you're you're stuck trying to buy the next model so you can stay in support and keep flying.
21:29
SPEAKER_06: What I what I thought was interesting is the fact that you've got a canine background and then you're also utilizing the drone.
21:35
SPEAKER_06: So with your canine background, how much of a benefit has it been, especially with searching for suspects uh and doing the search and rescue?
21:44
SPEAKER_06: How much how much have it what benefit has it been with you integrating with the drones uh in that search and rescue operations with sharing that information with the other drone pilots?
21:55
SPEAKER_06: Probably understanding perimeters and things like that.
21:57
SPEAKER_04: So I did a lot of searching.
21:58
SPEAKER_04: Um I was I was interested.
22:00
SPEAKER_04: In canine for a long time before I got into canine.
22:02
SPEAKER_04: Um, so I trained alongside them.
22:03
SPEAKER_04: So that's where our bi-weekly training came from, was because I was attached to them as well.
22:09
SPEAKER_04: And so we would go out, and I I know like hey, these guys are gonna run a pattern this way.
22:14
SPEAKER_04: This is the way their dog's gonna tell us um keep ahead of the dog because the dog may lose the scent and have to backtrack.
22:20
SPEAKER_04: Just pay attention to where they're going, they'll tell you.
22:22
SPEAKER_04: And it was a it was a working relationship between us and them.
22:25
SPEAKER_04: They got they bought in pretty quickly because we were able to get one of the first wins with them early on, or they end up locating the suspect just feet away from them, and they had no idea he was there.
22:35
SPEAKER_04: We saw him on thermal, like, hey, he's real close, like five feet off to your right.
22:40
SPEAKER_04: He's right there.
22:41
SPEAKER_04: That's huge.
22:41
SPEAKER_04: Yeah, and so they they wanted the they wanted the safety of knowing that they had Overwatch, keep an eye on them.
22:48
SPEAKER_04: Um so they bought in real fast, and we were able to, because I just left the unit, I left the unit in 2017, so it was perfect timing for me to come into this.
22:58
SPEAKER_04: So it was a year out.
22:58
SPEAKER_04: I knew all the guys, we had good work in relationships, and so I was able to work with them back and forth between the two sides and work out like how we're gonna communicate, who's gonna talk to who.
23:08
SPEAKER_04: Um in the in the early days we had a dedicated channel between the canine handler and the pilot.
23:12
SPEAKER_04: So that they always had direct communication.
23:14
SPEAKER_04: There was never any anybody clogging up our airways, saying something dumb that we don't need to hear about.
23:19
SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
23:20
SPEAKER_04: Uh there was always the direct communication between those two the whole time.
23:23
SPEAKER_08: And for our listeners, um, what he's talking about is um Tyler gets in a car chase at 2 a.m.
23:30
SPEAKER_08: The guy bails out near a green belt or a tree line and runs into it.
23:35
SPEAKER_08: I have I have three options either not pursue and hope he beds down quickly, chase him and utilize my flashlight to try and find him, which he now knows where I'm at, and if he's armed, he's gonna shoot at me.
23:51
SPEAKER_08: Or run through the woods in the dark blindly.
23:55
SPEAKER_08: And the options that he's talking about with an aircraft is um even if you pursue briefly um and you try to use some light discipline, you find yourself in the middle of the woods in the dark, you lose direction quickly.
24:09
SPEAKER_08: You don't always want to backlight or silhouette yourself with a flashlight.
24:12
SPEAKER_08: And so when you have these guys that can get up and have overwatch with some sort of night vision or thermals, it's a really, really refreshing feeling when you hear Jesus on the radio say, Hey, he's literally laying ten feet to your immediate right right now.
24:30
SPEAKER_08: He is ten feet because you can't see him.
24:33
SPEAKER_08: And whether he's armed or not, he poses a threat to you in the dark.
24:37
SPEAKER_08: And man, it's a great feeling hearing you guys come on the radio.
24:40
SPEAKER_08: And for years it was a helicopter because drones were not the uh technology that we have now, but man, it's a lifesaver to to hear somebody come on the radio and tell you, hey, you're about to walk up on him in 20 feet.
24:53
SPEAKER_08: He's literally laying in front of you in 20 feet.
24:55
SPEAKER_08: Yeah.
24:56
SPEAKER_06: And and this is a this is a challenge to Paralands and 200 man agency, 100 excuse me, 178 now, thanks to Brandon.
25:05
SPEAKER_06: Um it really doesn't make a shit if you're a 15-man sheriff's office, if you're a 50-man agency, 10-man agency, if you're going to implement drones and if you're going to work with other agencies, if you're gonna intertwine and other agencies work uh collectively and together, then you need to train together.
25:27
SPEAKER_06: And what I mean by that is that if Marshall PD is going to work with Harrison County Sheriff's Office, or if Mansfield PD is going to work with Terrent County and you're working nights and nothing's going on at nighttime, hook up with your drone operators with patrol and you guys get those empty buildings, that's nothing's going on, get permission from the homeowner or the landowner or whatever, and y'all work together and see how this is going to operate together and talk talk it out.
25:54
SPEAKER_06: Because if you don't train like you fight, when shit goes bad, we know how that works.
25:59
SPEAKER_04: So over the years we've hosted several uh regional training days where we bring in everybody from surrounding us to train together.
26:06
SPEAKER_04: Um and coming from the canine world, canine does that exceptionally well.
26:09
SPEAKER_04: Yep, yep.
26:10
SPEAKER_04: Right?
26:10
SPEAKER_04: They always get together in groups because one canine for this agency, one canine for this age, you can't train solo.
26:16
SPEAKER_04: And so they do well at coordinating and making training days.
26:19
SPEAKER_04: So we do the same thing.
26:20
SPEAKER_04: We will organize training days where we bring in several different agencies to fly with us.
26:24
SPEAKER_04: Um, and then at the well, for the most part, for us, it was a lot of teaching other agencies on what we were doing because we were already doing it and everybody was trying to figure out what we were doing.
26:32
SPEAKER_08: Well, and it's teaching patrol y'all's capabilities and how to support y'all and how y'all can support them.
26:37
SPEAKER_08: It's like years ago you just called a dog, but nobody knew you should be setting a perimeter.
26:44
SPEAKER_08: Nobody knew you should have a roving unit to pin them down.
26:46
SPEAKER_08: I mean, there was a lot that the operator and patrol to to understand how to maximize the support for each other.
26:54
SPEAKER_08: There's a lot of communication and understanding that needs to go on of let me tell you what I need from you, and then you tell me what you need from me, and then let's make this work.
27:01
SPEAKER_08: And as this technology, you know, changes, and I I'm a dinosaur but out of it, but I would need you guys to tell me what I can do before y'all get on scene, or vice versa, so that we're maximizing the effectiveness of this technology.
27:15
SPEAKER_03: Right.
27:16
SPEAKER_03: Like one of the biggest things that I've always harped on through training all the pilots that we have with Paraland now is communication, because communication is always the first thing that fails.
27:24
SPEAKER_03: So we had a fur a few different ways that we tackled that, utilizing uh one of the softwares that we use where as a uh drone program is called Drone Sense, and we're able to push out the live feed from the drone to any stakeholder we want to push it to without credentials.
27:38
SPEAKER_03: And so if we get sent out to a suspect search or a missing person search, uh dispatch has that uh a simple link that they put in the call notes and now patrol supervisors, everybody can see exactly what our drones can see.
27:50
SPEAKER_03: Commands you got it.
27:52
SPEAKER_03: That's cool.
27:52
SPEAKER_03: Wow.
27:53
SPEAKER_03: Um so we push out that way.
27:54
SPEAKER_03: It also helps because we work closely with our canines.
27:57
SPEAKER_03: One of our trainings that we always did was a canine joint training that we had, and so we learned how to communicate with each other on, you know, and it went away from hey, the suspect is neck by the tree next to the bush, and now we're able to say he's you know 100 feet, 200 feet off the dog's one o'clock, right?
28:15
SPEAKER_03: Or the handler's one o'clock.
28:17
SPEAKER_00: Oh, yeah.
28:17
SPEAKER_03: So building out those communication pathways was one of the bigger challenges that we had because we didn't know what we were doing.
28:23
SPEAKER_03: Like we're not we're not flying aircraft in the air, you know, before we got drones and stuff.
28:27
SPEAKER_03: So we had to think about how to articulate from an aerial perspective what it looks like on the ground and how to accurately explain that to somebody on the ground who has no idea what they're seeing, especially at night, right?
28:38
SPEAKER_03: You can't just say, hey, go north, right?
28:40
SPEAKER_03: A lot of a lot of the officers don't know where north is at night.
28:43
SPEAKER_03: Uh so we had to figure out ways to Or during the day.
28:45
SPEAKER_03: Or during the day.
28:47
SPEAKER_03: Um so we had to figure out pathways to be able to communicate that, and that was one of the bigger challenges that we had.
28:53
SPEAKER_08: So so is a small agency with a with a smaller budget wanted to dip their toe into a drone platform, what what would a decent functional aircraft what would it take for them to get off the ground at a reasonable price?
29:13
SPEAKER_08: Just a ballpark.
29:14
SPEAKER_04: To get in the door, less than ten grand.
29:17
SPEAKER_04: To get that first aircraft, uh something that's thermal capable, extra batteries, um a good controller that'll get them in the door, get them all the things they need to get their first program going.
29:29
SPEAKER_04: And it's it's such a force multiplier.
29:31
SPEAKER_04: So for even for a small agency and you got five guys on patrol, and now you got an air unit in that patrol unit, that one guy now become four or five guys.
29:38
SPEAKER_04: Right?
29:39
SPEAKER_04: You only need a couple guys to lay that perimeter, and now he can he can support everybody.
29:42
SPEAKER_03: Right.
29:43
SPEAKER_03: And that 10 grand uh goes an extremely long way.
29:46
SPEAKER_03: You'll be able to do 95% of all the deployments you'll ever need to do with that one 10 grand.
29:51
SPEAKER_03: And that's several hundred dollars cheaper than a helicopter.
29:53
SPEAKER_03: Just a little bit.
29:54
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
29:55
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
29:56
SPEAKER_08: So you buy you buy an aircraft like that.
29:58
SPEAKER_08: How long would you reasonably expect that to last if you continue to do software updates?
30:06
SPEAKER_08: I guess software updates is kind of like an iPhone.
30:08
SPEAKER_08: I mean, it's going to tell you from time to time, hey, you need to upgrade, and then at some point it's outdated.
30:13
SPEAKER_06: But how long reasonably Well, Clint, because I've attended the recently uh updated 107 class, that depends on the manufacturer update.
30:22
SPEAKER_04: Um Usually an aircraft like that gets you two to three years.
30:26
SPEAKER_04: Okay.
30:26
SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
30:27
SPEAKER_04: Two or three years of flight of flight time before you you have to upgrade that aircraft to the newest model.
30:31
SPEAKER_04: Uh, just because they just stopped supporting the older models.
30:33
SPEAKER_04: They have so many new models coming out.
30:34
SPEAKER_08: And in the grand scheme of things, nine or ten grand to save one autistic child, or to not get an officer killed on a call is nothing.
30:45
SPEAKER_08: I mean, the that's in in it's crazy.
30:48
SPEAKER_08: Right.
30:48
SPEAKER_04: And and here's the real kicker.
30:50
SPEAKER_04: Um so you spend that ten grand, you buy a drone.
30:52
SPEAKER_04: Um we've all worked fatal accidents, right?
30:54
SPEAKER_04: Or we close the roadway for seven hours while we come out and reconstruct it.
30:58
SPEAKER_04: Um now I can close that roadway for let's say an hour and a half, two hours tops while I bring the drone to the scene.
31:05
SPEAKER_04: I set the map up with the drone, and I map the whole thing with it with an aircraft, and I get you uh down to a centimeter accurate, and we're out we're out of the roadway in in two hours.
31:15
SPEAKER_03: Or back in service.
31:16
SPEAKER_03: You don't have roadways closed.
31:18
SPEAKER_03: The fastest time I've cleared a scene from the data collection standpoint, from what you were doing with a total station or a ferro scanner, was 20 minutes.
31:26
SPEAKER_03: And that was a that was a full fatal in high.
31:29
SPEAKER_04: It took longer to get the records there for us to clear the scene.
31:31
SPEAKER_03: It was 20 minutes.
31:32
SPEAKER_03: On average, I can clear it, I can do my side of 40.
31:34
SPEAKER_03: But just like you were saying, in two hours you can have all of it done.
31:38
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
31:39
SPEAKER_04: You're talking about taking a an all-night scene to a to a two-hour process, and you're you're back in service, your your units are back in.
31:46
SPEAKER_04: Um that's our our our policy is 100% drones on crash reconstruction now.
31:49
SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
31:50
SPEAKER_08: Wow, I never even considered that.
31:52
SPEAKER_08: Yeah.
31:52
SPEAKER_08: Well, and not just the cop stuck blocking the highway for six or seven hours, but the people stuck sitting on I-10 for six or seven hours.
32:03
SPEAKER_03: Secondary crashes get eliminated, right?
32:05
SPEAKER_03: Because you're clearing that roadway way faster, way sooner, getting them back in service, opening up commerce again, especially if you're on toll road.
32:12
SPEAKER_08: Wow.
32:13
SPEAKER_08: So we got a whole lot of topics to left to cover.
32:16
SPEAKER_08: Let's talk about let's stay on y'all for a minute and talk about um DFR.
32:22
SPEAKER_08: Mm-hmm.
32:23
SPEAKER_08: DFR.
32:23
SPEAKER_03: Drone is first responder.
32:25
SPEAKER_08: Drone futures.
32:26
SPEAKER_08: First responder.
32:27
SPEAKER_08: So is anybody in the country doing that?
32:30
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, there's about um 15 agencies.
32:33
SPEAKER_03: Don't correct me, Bury.
32:34
SPEAKER_03: Um there's about 15 agencies.
32:36
SPEAKER_03: Uh just listen here.
32:37
SPEAKER_03: This is his expert area.
32:38
SPEAKER_08: Just look at him, shake your head, and I can do that.
32:41
SPEAKER_01: Here we go.
32:42
SPEAKER_03: Um There's about 15 agencies nationwide right now that have an active DFR uh program, droneist first responder program.
32:49
SPEAKER_03: And for those who don't know what a drone is first responder program is, that's where a 911 call for service drops.
32:55
SPEAKER_03: And then uh a drone that is pre-positioned throughout the city or county uh automatically launches and flies to the scene, streaming the live feed to responding personnel, whether that's firefighters, EMS, SAR teams, law enforcement.
33:10
SPEAKER_03: Um utilizing that feed, they can either clear the call with the drone or they can de-escalate the scene, uh, adjust resource allocation.
33:18
SPEAKER_03: Do we need more people?
33:19
SPEAKER_03: Do we not need more people?
33:21
SPEAKER_03: Um get that eye in the sky of the scene and get it in your hands before you ever get there while you're en route, right?
33:28
SPEAKER_03: Um so there's there's about 15 agencies across the nation that are running it.
33:32
SPEAKER_03: Chula Vista, California was the very first agency back in 2018.
33:35
SPEAKER_03: They got special authorizations from the fed uh from the FAA uh to be able to fly beyond visual line of sight um to be able to do that type of operation.
33:43
SPEAKER_06: And what does that mean?
33:44
SPEAKER_06: You want to talk to you on that topic?
33:46
SPEAKER_03: One of the requirements to be able to fly a drone and make money with uh per the FAA is that you have to maintain visual line of sight of the drone at all times.
33:53
SPEAKER_03: And what that means is it's not only that you have to be able to see the drone, but you also have to be able to de-conflict the airspace.
33:58
SPEAKER_03: Uh so if there's uh another aircraft coming in, you need to be able to know what that aircraft is doing, what altitude it's at, where it's heading, is it going to hit my drone?
34:06
SPEAKER_03: Um and so that's a big component of, or one of the bigger challenges that you have is a drone in a trunk solution where you know you get on scene, you pull your drunk drone out of the back of your car, and then you launch it.
34:16
SPEAKER_03: Well, DFR, you're going to have people pre-positioned to be able to clear the airspace.
34:21
SPEAKER_03: They got a very first uh waiver to be able to see up to two miles out because obviously that's way further than a human can have depth perception, right?
34:30
SPEAKER_03: But they were able to get authorizations to be able to do that a little bit a little bit further.
34:34
SPEAKER_03: They were pioneering on that.
34:36
SPEAKER_03: Um I was fortunate enough to be uh well persistent enough to get a uh the very first fully beyond visual line of sight waiver in the nation.
34:46
SPEAKER_03: Uh so apparently it's the only agency in the United States right now that can fly drone as first responder operations without ever having any eyes on the drone or the airspace around it.
34:55
SPEAKER_03: Uh we have a technological infrastructure in place to be able to clean the airspace for us.
35:01
SPEAKER_03: Um but we're building out uh six launch locations across our city.
35:05
SPEAKER_03: Uh we have both controlled airspace and uncontrolled airspace, which means highly restrictive airspace and not highly restrictive airspace.
35:12
SPEAKER_03: Um and once we have that fully built out, we'll be able to basically cover just about every nook and cranny of our city uh for any type of call for service so that we can get the drone there first to de-escalate situations.
35:24
SPEAKER_06: So uh just I guess explain what that would look like for just any call for service.
35:29
SPEAKER_06: Bank robbery in progress, uh you know, shots fired, uh any kind of call for service within Perry Land, what would that look like for that type of drone?
35:39
SPEAKER_03: So what would end up happening, the call for service would drop.
35:42
SPEAKER_03: Um the call for service information would populate on our drone sense platform, uh, which is what we utilize to pilot the systems.
35:49
SPEAKER_03: Okay.
35:50
SPEAKER_03: A docking station that we have pre-positioned throughout the city would then open up the dock that's uh the drone that's housed inside of that dock would then launch.
35:57
SPEAKER_06: Aaron Powell And who and who would launch it?
35:58
SPEAKER_06: It just automatically launches from dispatch?
36:00
SPEAKER_03: Right.
36:01
SPEAKER_03: So dispatch would would end up launching the call, the DFR supervisor would authorize a deployment for that.
36:06
SPEAKER_03: So, like for example, we're not gonna fly for barking dog complaints, right?
36:10
SPEAKER_03: But uh we will fly for off-screen ball shootings, uh verbal disturbances, welfare concerns, things of that nature where we think a drone would benefit patrol having that eye in the sky, right?
36:19
SPEAKER_03: So the drone would autonomously launch, it would autonomously fly to that location, and then the pilot can then pilot the drone remotely at RPD for all six of those launch locations.
36:30
SPEAKER_03: Um so he's gonna be inside of our police department flying on a PS5 controller through uh drone sense.
36:36
SPEAKER_03: And so that way they're able to not only get to the scene and be able to get that live fee, but also maneuver the drone if it becomes a dynamic situation.
36:43
SPEAKER_03: Or like almost happens every single crash, they're in the wrong block.
36:47
SPEAKER_03: Right?
36:47
SPEAKER_03: We can go through and re- readjust so that they can get eyes on for those scenes.
36:51
SPEAKER_08: Are there any DFR programs in Texas currently, other than y'all?
36:54
SPEAKER_03: There's a couple, uh not very many.
36:56
SPEAKER_03: Uh those are building out quickly.
36:58
SPEAKER_03: Uh so Memorial Villages uh down here in Houston as well, uh, they've had a DFR program for a little while uh as well.
37:05
SPEAKER_03: But in Texas, there's not very many of them.
37:07
SPEAKER_03: But um there's several of them that are building out.
37:11
SPEAKER_03: So for example, uh San Antonio uh is in an active uh DFR program now.
37:16
SPEAKER_03: Uh they're working to build out and figure out how many sites they're going to need, but uh they got pretty high aspirations too over there.
37:22
SPEAKER_03: So they're they're a good agency to keep an eye on.
37:24
SPEAKER_06: But y'all's is unique because y'all's is not y'all's is completely unmanned and y'all can launch yeah.
37:30
SPEAKER_03: So all of the other DFR programs require somebody to be able to see two miles around the drone at all times, no matter where that drone's going.
37:38
SPEAKER_03: We're our agency is the only agency that does not have that requirement.
37:42
SPEAKER_06: In the nation.
37:43
SPEAKER_03: In the nation.
37:44
SPEAKER_03: Is that because of your uh FAA background or um that's because of my persistence.
37:48
SPEAKER_03: Because he's a thorn in the side of the FAA.
37:50
SPEAKER_07: That's true.
37:50
SPEAKER_08: Um That's fair.
37:52
SPEAKER_08: He called you obnoxious earlier, you can call him a thorn.
37:54
SPEAKER_08: Uh no, he is.
37:55
SPEAKER_08: They they will they will tell you that.
37:56
SPEAKER_04: Yeah, they will he he spent two years developing the well, yeah, but a year of research and then a year of debate.
38:03
SPEAKER_03: Um but uh to the FAA's uh credit, this is something that's never been done before, right?
38:09
SPEAKER_03: People are always going to be cautious about something that's never been done before.
38:14
SPEAKER_03: Um and so we were able to network and and have discussions with individuals in the FAA that were progressive-minded and and were wanting to move forward with the next phase of DFR, right?
38:27
SPEAKER_03: And they held me to making sure that it's safe, right?
38:30
SPEAKER_03: Like that was the biggest hurdle is showing that what we're going to do, we can safely de-conflict the airspace.
38:35
SPEAKER_03: We can safely make sure that we're not going to fly our drone into an aircraft, right?
38:39
SPEAKER_08: So you mentioned earlier when a call comes out, it'll pop off autonomously, fly to the site autonomously.
38:47
SPEAKER_08: Is that triggered by the type of priority call?
38:51
SPEAKER_04: Is there a system internally in the hardware that if it rises to the level of that, or is there somebody physically launching it and then it is Right now it's just gonna be it'd be what whoever's pilot's on duty watches our CAD and watches our fire CAD, EMS CAD.
39:10
SPEAKER_04: And with either calls that they think, hey, this is gonna be a beneficial to the to that call, then they go and launch the drone.
39:17
SPEAKER_08: But it's autonomous until the pilot can make it to the st to the flight station and sit down and then take physical.
39:24
SPEAKER_03: So the call for service populates.
39:26
SPEAKER_03: Uh they hit go.
39:28
SPEAKER_03: At that once they hit once they click go to that call for service, the drone will automatically do its thing.
39:32
SPEAKER_03: And then they can take over once it gets on site.
39:35
SPEAKER_06: Yeah, you mean you haven't seen it yet, but it and I'll I'll at this point in time I'll I'll show it up on the screen.
39:40
SPEAKER_06: It's it's like a tomb.
39:41
SPEAKER_06: I mean it's like a missile.
39:43
SPEAKER_06: It it opens up.
39:45
SPEAKER_06: And it it flies out of this deal, and it's strategically placed within Pareland and it flies to the location.
39:51
SPEAKER_06: Right.
39:52
SPEAKER_08: So there'll be secure locations around the city, rooftop, ground-based, correct.
39:57
SPEAKER_08: Where these tombs are.
40:00
SPEAKER_06: I didn't want to say like missile blood.
40:03
SPEAKER_06: Yeah, docking station.
40:04
SPEAKER_06: But it's that's kind of like a tomb.
40:05
SPEAKER_06: It's I mean, they're concreted into the ground and yeah, yeah.
40:08
SPEAKER_03: So we j just like you said, we have uh we're utilizing uh several different city locations.
40:13
SPEAKER_03: So a lot of them are fire stations.
40:15
SPEAKER_03: Um the great thing about fire stations is they require by federal law to be positioned so many miles away from each other uh so that they can have the coverage.
40:23
SPEAKER_03: So they make a an outstanding location to pre-position these drone sites so that I can fly to any call for service in that dr in that district or beat.
40:32
SPEAKER_08: Um it won't wake any firemen when it won't.
40:35
SPEAKER_03: It does beep.
40:36
SPEAKER_03: Um, so maybe the decimals need to be a loud.
40:40
SPEAKER_03: But it does um love you guys.
40:43
SPEAKER_03: It does open up and it does it does beep when it does that, so they may wake up.
40:47
SPEAKER_03: Um but we're launching from a lot of different fire stations.
40:51
SPEAKER_03: We're also gonna be launching from the police department, um, and then we're launching from our city service center where we do all the repairs and and whatnot on our vehicles because it's strategically positioned very closely to a Walmart.
41:02
SPEAKER_03: So um that way we can get on site very, very quickly for those coffer service.
41:06
SPEAKER_08: And so, real time, the the the gut, the meat of it is, and especially for our military folks, that launches and gets on site like military ISR.
41:15
SPEAKER_08: Yes, and it's gonna beat due to no traffic, red lights, you got it, all of that, and it's flying uh as a crow flies, it's beating two squads responding to a call stuck at red lights and traffic and right, yes.
41:32
SPEAKER_03: Generally speaking, it's beating it by about three three to five minutes, depending on location of the other officer, right?
41:37
SPEAKER_03: Uh for those calls for service because they don't have to worry about somebody anchoring down in the lane, right?
41:42
SPEAKER_03: You don't have to worry about um people just driving slow because you know there's an officer behind them, things of that nature.
41:47
SPEAKER_08: And getting to a hot call or a potential hot call three to five minutes before everybody else, there's so much potential intelligence.
41:57
SPEAKER_08: Right.
41:58
SPEAKER_03: That it's not just the intelligence, though, right?
42:00
SPEAKER_03: Like the drone can actually clear the call.
42:02
SPEAKER_03: Uh so for example, uh Chula Vista actually has a running dashboard that they close out every at the end of every day since 2018 of all of their calls for service that they fly the drone with.
42:11
SPEAKER_03: Um, of those calls for service, they typically are able to clear a quarter of their calls for service with just the drone.
42:17
SPEAKER_03: They're able to de disregard responding first responders without ever getting on scene.
42:24
SPEAKER_08: Yeah, if you're having 20,000 calls for service a year and you're clearing 5,000 of them a year without tying up staffing, and man, that's huge.
42:35
SPEAKER_08: Yeah.
42:35
SPEAKER_07: Name one cop that handles a quarter of all the calls for service.
42:37
SPEAKER_06: Yeah, but we don't we don't want the city council knowing.
42:40
SPEAKER_08: Well, but by intelligence, I mean it's right, right, right.
42:43
SPEAKER_08: You you get that call of you know, a guy's abused his wife or a builder at knife point, the drone gets overhead and sees him leave, and you have multiple squads because it sounds like an imminent threat, right?
42:56
SPEAKER_08: Driving Mach 20 trying to get there, you can tell them, hey, and Crown Vicks go down.
43:00
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, and Crown VIX, which aren't safe, and you know, so we had a win uh early on with our DFR program uh when we were doing testing.
43:08
SPEAKER_03: Uh so we have flock cameras uh right on one of the other side of the town center mall where we have our first launch site.
43:14
SPEAKER_03: It pinged.
43:15
SPEAKER_03: We got the drone in the air extremely fast, we were able to locate the uh stolen vehicle that it alerted us to.
43:22
SPEAKER_03: We tracked it to an H E B and it pulled off in a parking lot.
43:26
SPEAKER_04: So Patrol was still roaming the streets looking for it, and I was able to I I was able to put the drone up in one spot and search like seven parking lots in minutes.
43:34
SPEAKER_04: Yeah, found it.
43:36
SPEAKER_04: Um it was parking, saw the the driver get out, walk in the store, was like, hey, I think I have it.
43:41
SPEAKER_04: Y'all gotta go confirm the plate for me because I can't see the plate from where I am.
43:44
SPEAKER_04: And watched him walk all the way into the store, gave Patrol the description of the person, clothing they were wearing.
43:49
SPEAKER_04: Patrol showed up, confirmed the plate, walked in, found the person.
43:51
SPEAKER_04: It was registered owner, just hadn't been taken out of the system.
43:54
SPEAKER_04: Oh and so they were able to bring that person back out, build the whole problem, no, no issue.
44:00
SPEAKER_04: Juice, right?
44:01
SPEAKER_04: Real fast, real quick win, and freed up you know a dozen units in minutes versus everybody looking for this one stolen car.
44:08
SPEAKER_05: Wow.
44:09
SPEAKER_04: It's crazy.
44:11
SPEAKER_08: And y'all you have a platform where you officially can you document your calls for service of response, you document wins or clears wins, I guess as you call them.
44:20
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, so um drone sense does all that for us.
44:23
SPEAKER_03: Uh it autonomously um tracks all the flights, it autonomously tracks what systems we're running, what the battery, like all the way down to the battery, tablet, whatever we're running, drone sense tracks it all.
44:34
SPEAKER_03: But what's also great is we have a back end on there as well where you can log suspects found, arrests made, stolen vehicles, seized property, narcotic value, narcotics stolen uh seized.
44:44
SPEAKER_03: Um and at the end of every year, we compile that and I present it to Chief.
44:47
SPEAKER_03: Uh and so that way it shows not just that we're flying a lot, right?
44:50
SPEAKER_03: But also that we have wins because at the end of the day, that's what really matters.
44:54
SPEAKER_03: Um and so we document all of that um and present that.
44:59
SPEAKER_03: We're also required by state law uh to report all of the flights every single uh odd year between January 1st and January 15th.
45:07
SPEAKER_03: Um and so not only am I required to do that anyway, but we do it every year.
45:12
SPEAKER_03: Uh and we also present that up because that's like I said, that's what keeps the budget going.
45:16
SPEAKER_03: Because it's not just, yeah, we flew a thousand times.
45:18
SPEAKER_03: Well, how many suspects you find?
45:19
SPEAKER_03: Not one.
45:20
SPEAKER_01: Right.
45:20
SPEAKER_03: That's not helpful.
45:21
SPEAKER_08: Yeah.
45:22
SPEAKER_08: Right.
45:23
SPEAKER_08: So DroneSense is um an outside company, but basically law enforcement drone support.
45:32
SPEAKER_03: Correct.
45:32
SPEAKER_03: So DroneSense is a software as a service.
45:34
SPEAKER_03: Um, they are solely focused on public safety.
45:39
SPEAKER_03: So everything that DroneSense has built out is designed for law enforcement, fire EMS uh type responses and maintenance.
45:46
SPEAKER_03: So um not only does it provide secure live streams, but it also safeguards and tracks everything on the back end from a program management perspective, uh, which pretty much did my job for the last two years that I worked for Paralleling, which is great.
45:58
SPEAKER_03: Uh but like before that we were running Excel spreadsheets, right?
46:02
SPEAKER_03: And so like that was obnoxious because that's clunky.
46:04
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, it's clunky, and if somebody forgets to log out, it locks the whole thing down, right?
46:08
SPEAKER_06: So it's almost kind of kind of the watch guard of a control camera when the drone world is correct.
46:15
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, it tracks all that.
46:16
SPEAKER_03: It doesn't we don't save any of the of the data as far as uh video and photos and stuff because we don't want to deal with the chain of custody of that.
46:23
SPEAKER_03: That all just saves to the SD card on the drone, but we track all the rest of it.
46:27
SPEAKER_03: Um so we're able to export all that information out.
46:30
SPEAKER_03: So prime example of that back in 2022, the last stats that I have in my head uh was our most prolific year we had, and I was able to pull all that information out of DroneSense.
46:38
SPEAKER_03: So we had a little over 256 deployments um for live operations.
46:44
SPEAKER_03: Uh I I pushed them real hard last year.
46:46
SPEAKER_03: It's like fly, fly, fly.
46:48
SPEAKER_03: Uh we found 84 suspects, 54 arrests, five victims located, uh, 22 stolen vehicles located,$1.4 million in seizure fund asset uh assistance, and 1,400 stolen items.
47:00
SPEAKER_05: 1.4 million?
47:02
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, we had a bunch of Cadillac converters.
47:04
SPEAKER_04: Ah so so we're we're attached to if you can think of a division of the PD and you're thinking, man, I wonder if air support would help that.
47:10
SPEAKER_06: Property.
47:10
SPEAKER_04: We get we get stuff, we get we get tests with them.
47:13
SPEAKER_04: Um so when our uh special special investigative group goes out and they need to go find something, then what better way to find it than in the air?
47:20
SPEAKER_04: Yeah, yeah, right?
47:21
SPEAKER_04: Um, so we clear a lot of that stuff with them.
47:23
SPEAKER_04: I work with our detectives, we work with our special investigative group, we work with our crime scene group.
47:28
SPEAKER_06: Damn, but you're with you're assigned a patrol, though.
47:30
SPEAKER_06: Oh yeah, you must get a shit ton of overtime.
47:32
SPEAKER_04: Uh a little bit.
47:33
SPEAKER_04: A little bit.
47:34
SPEAKER_04: I bet.
47:35
SPEAKER_04: I bet.
47:35
SPEAKER_04: Um we do all the reconstructions for the city.
47:38
SPEAKER_06: Um so your traffic, you're attached to CID, traffic, patrol, SWAT.
47:44
SPEAKER_04: SWAT, canine.
47:45
SPEAKER_04: Canine.
47:46
SPEAKER_04: All of all of that that's that's why we're continuing to expand our unit if we're just more tasking.
47:51
SPEAKER_03: We've integrated into every aspect of law enforcement, apparently.
47:54
SPEAKER_03: Every single one of them.
47:54
SPEAKER_04: The city's grown their drone program uh uh associated with us, and so they've taken we used to have we used to have the two of us used to do all the city tasks too.
48:01
SPEAKER_04: I used to take pictures of buildings for the city.
48:02
SPEAKER_06: Yeah, so Quentin, you didn't know this, but the city was there.
48:04
SPEAKER_06: So they have done all the city like City Works, Public Works was here, fire departments.
48:09
SPEAKER_06: I mean, so this is expanding continuously.
48:12
SPEAKER_06: That's cool.
48:12
SPEAKER_08: Yeah, so so we w a lot of people like me thought a drone program, a drone was an aircraft intended to be external, to be flown outside.
48:24
SPEAKER_08: Tell us a little bit about how y'all developed it in the capability of like you mentioned SWAT SWAT support and the abilities that you guys and the life saving preventing harm and and and exposure.
48:40
SPEAKER_08: Tell the listeners a little bit about that, what that looks like.
48:43
SPEAKER_04: So that that's that's our most recent expansion is into our uh our SWAT and our our um warrant team.
48:49
SPEAKER_04: We have a we just created a warrant team for not SWAT events.
48:53
SPEAKER_04: And our cart team is a three-agency group cart team.
48:57
SPEAKER_04: And so when they go to calls, we get we get sent with them.
49:00
SPEAKER_04: Originally we were external support, so we flew the outside of the house and broadcast that flight through drone sense so that our command staff could easily see what what we could see.
49:09
SPEAKER_04: Right?
49:10
SPEAKER_04: Because command always wants a a better picture of what's going on.
49:13
SPEAKER_04: They're stuck down the street, got no idea, getting half half stories from one person.
49:18
SPEAKER_04: And so they want a better idea, so they gave them a good visual picture of the actual scene.
49:23
SPEAKER_04: And then we've expanded into the internal side.
49:25
SPEAKER_04: So now when we breach a building, we can send a drone in first before the first officer has to go inside.
49:30
SPEAKER_04: So the further for the before the first conflict between an officer and a suspect, there's a conflict between a drone and a suspect.
49:37
SPEAKER_04: And so that's a that's a$500 drone that I'm sending inside that house.
49:41
SPEAKER_04: If they decide to take a baseball bet to it, if they decide to steal it, I I got$500 out.
49:49
SPEAKER_04: I I'm not I'm not out a fortune of money.
49:52
SPEAKER_04: It's uh easily replaceable, and it's a it's a great tool.
49:56
SPEAKER_04: And most of the time when we go inside um as soon as it clears the door, you can watch our videos, you can watch other agencies' videos, um, suspects come to it, they're drawn to it just because it's loud and they want to know what's going on inside their house.
50:11
SPEAKER_04: They're used to the door getting kicked in and a bunch of cops storming in the door.
50:15
SPEAKER_04: And so when it's not a bunch of cops, then they're like, Why did you kick my door in?
50:18
SPEAKER_04: And what's that buzzing sound in my house?
50:21
SPEAKER_08: Um is something about to go boom.
50:23
SPEAKER_04: Yes.
50:24
SPEAKER_04: So my my my first my first indoor deployment, uh one person refused to come out of the house.
50:29
SPEAKER_04: I flew inside, and no sooner I was I was still over the doormat inside the front door when he poked his head around the corner to see what had come in the house.
50:37
SPEAKER_04: And the team was able to immediately give him verbal commands.
50:40
SPEAKER_04: He knew he was seen and he came out of the house.
50:42
SPEAKER_06: What I thought was cool is he said the team actually carries multiple batteries.
50:45
SPEAKER_06: And so you just set the drone down when you when you're out of batteries, you set the drone down, the teams practice this, uh, where they deploy the battery back on it, you lift off, and and you can continue with the search inside the residence, which is it that's that makes a huge difference.
50:58
SPEAKER_04: For large structures, that's our that's our goal is to make it where I can I can land it, they can make it put new batteries in it, we can leakfrog it forward again.
51:05
SPEAKER_06: Yeah, that's awesome.
51:06
SPEAKER_06: I mean, you're talking about a game changer.
51:08
SPEAKER_04: Yes.
51:09
SPEAKER_03: And we want to talk about how easy it is to fly one of these.
51:11
SPEAKER_03: So when I first got our very first one in, um there was an officer who was walking through the PD that was on SWAT, and I said, Hey, come here.
51:20
SPEAKER_03: I need you to fly this drone.
51:21
SPEAKER_03: He's like, I've never flown a drone in my life.
51:22
SPEAKER_03: I was like, I know, but this is a SWAT drone, so it's got to be easy to fly and it's gotta be crashable.
51:27
SPEAKER_03: So let's see if you can make it happen, right?
51:29
SPEAKER_03: And he was like, All right, I'll give it a shot.
51:30
SPEAKER_03: And he was like, But I'm not in trouble if I crash a drone.
51:32
SPEAKER_03: It's like, no, it's on me.
51:33
SPEAKER_03: I got it.
51:33
SPEAKER_03: So he put it up, he put the goggles on, he flew the drone, he cleared the entire downstairs of our police department.
51:39
SPEAKER_03: Uh, never flying a drone in his life, didn't crash this drone.
51:42
SPEAKER_03: No kidding.
51:44
SPEAKER_03: And he did it in about seven minutes.
51:46
SPEAKER_03: Um, so that's how user-friendly these are.
51:49
SPEAKER_03: That's how stable they are indoors.
51:51
SPEAKER_03: Uh, I mean, they're a game changer of moving from dynamic entries to these static entries WAT deployments.
51:56
SPEAKER_05: And they're goggle worn?
51:57
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, so these are goggle worn.
51:59
SPEAKER_08: Wow.
52:00
SPEAKER_08: It's pretty cool.
52:02
SPEAKER_08: Pretty cool.
52:03
SPEAKER_08: So there's there's been the the session just end well, no, the session just didn't end it.
52:08
SPEAKER_08: Just ended in this back in special session, but there were some bills this year that started out a bit controversial, but more so due to the educational component and and people having an understanding rather than just um innuendos or or um rumors or tweets.
52:32
SPEAKER_08: Share a little bit about the the drone bill and the DGI and the beliefs and the but the reality behind some of that the technology.
52:44
SPEAKER_03: Certainly.
52:44
SPEAKER_03: Um so there were three country of origin bans uh that came through.
52:48
SPEAKER_03: Florida was the first state in the nation to get a state-issued ban on DGI platforms.
52:54
SPEAKER_03: Um it was catastrophic to Florida uh for that.
52:58
SPEAKER_03: They had a hurricane come in later that year, um, and they still had to fly all the drones that they just got banned because we needed to save lives, right?
53:06
SPEAKER_03: Um so one of the challenges that and one of the educational issues that we have about these systems is um in the very early days of DGI, there were two platforms that uh a study was done by DOD uh and it was found that there was information going back to China, right?
53:22
SPEAKER_03: That from all the data that I've been able to find on it and talking to some of the people who helped do some of the tests, um they don't know where the data went, they just know it went to China, mainland China.
53:33
SPEAKER_03: That could have gone to DGI so that they can do market analysis to build the next latest and greatest, right?
53:37
SPEAKER_03: That could have gone to the Chinese government, we don't know.
53:40
SPEAKER_03: Um, that information got out.
53:42
SPEAKER_03: Uh, there was an update to the drone, that door got closed.
53:45
SPEAKER_03: Since then, there have been around six independent studies on these platforms that has validated that there is no data being leaked out like that anymore.
53:53
SPEAKER_03: You can run these systems completely off network.
53:55
SPEAKER_03: Uh, even the Pentagon has gone through and said, okay, yeah, the we've safeguarded those holes that we found.
54:01
SPEAKER_03: Um so that's one of the concerns.
54:04
SPEAKER_03: Uh so having those discussions and explaining that, you know, yeah, there this is a platform made in China, but so is all of our Wi-Fi routers, right?
54:12
SPEAKER_03: So is all the cameras that we're running, so is all of the laptops that we're on.
54:16
SPEAKER_03: They all have Chinese components in them.
54:18
SPEAKER_03: Um if that is truly a concern, then I recommend not banning the platform, but require a data security policy in place, right?
54:26
SPEAKER_03: It's no different than any of the other computers that IT brings on.
54:29
SPEAKER_03: They're required to do it a data security analysis of those systems to make sure that it meets their policy.
54:34
SPEAKER_03: Do the same thing with these.
54:35
SPEAKER_03: These are just flying computers.
54:37
SPEAKER_03: You don't have to overcomplicate it.
54:39
SPEAKER_03: But doing an outright ban on these systems, because again, over 95% of public safety agencies are using DJI or a Chinese manufacturer platform, that would be catastrophic to agencies across the nation.
54:51
SPEAKER_03: And because Florida fell, there have been multiple other states that are also falling.
54:56
SPEAKER_03: This has happened in Arkansas, this has happened in, I believe it was Alabama, it's happened in Tennessee.
55:01
SPEAKER_03: Um, and so this is all coming forward.
55:04
SPEAKER_03: Texas was one of them uh that had bills forward, California also had bills forward, both Texas and California are able to um educate the legislators on how that would be catastrophic and what are some alternatives to those bills so that we can kind of meet in the middle on that, right?
55:20
SPEAKER_03: We definitely need data security.
55:21
SPEAKER_03: We definitely need to make sure that the data that we're collecting is safeguarded, right?
55:26
SPEAKER_03: Nobody would disagree with that.
55:27
SPEAKER_03: But we're not going to completely eliminate a manufacturer just because there may be a data security concern.
55:34
SPEAKER_08: So two questions.
55:35
SPEAKER_08: Is a component of DRAM uh drone sense, is a component of them data security that is a firewall, so to speak, for we are so we are we are uh SOC2 type two certified, we're also TextRamp certified.
55:49
SPEAKER_03: So that means things in the IT world for COP, it doesn't, but for IT data security side of the world, that that's incredibly important.
55:56
SPEAKER_03: I can also tell you, as somebody who's crashed a lot of drones, um when I sent those drones into re into DJI for repair, they didn't have the flight logs because we fly everything in drone sense.
56:06
SPEAKER_03: Right?
56:07
SPEAKER_03: So if they wanted the flight log to be able to go through and figure out what happened, I had to send it to them.
56:12
SPEAKER_07: Okay.
56:12
SPEAKER_03: So that that validated for me that they don't have access to this stuff, right?
56:17
SPEAKER_03: Um that was a big component of it.
56:20
SPEAKER_03: Uh but yes, there is a lot of data security that goes into that.
56:23
SPEAKER_03: I mean, it uh Texas DPS is running drone sense with all of their uh platforms that they're running as well.
56:29
SPEAKER_03: Um with with DGI product?
56:32
SPEAKER_03: Mm-hmm.
56:32
SPEAKER_03: Uh DJI and uh and autel, they have a few different pro platforms.
56:35
SPEAKER_03: Uh they're looking at other non-Chinese platforms in the event that a country of origin ban does get passed.
56:40
SPEAKER_03: So they're they are it's good to have a diverse fleet in the event that something happens, right?
56:44
SPEAKER_03: Um, but they do primarily have a Chinese platform system as well.
56:48
SPEAKER_03: I mean, that would be catastrophic to Operation Lone Star as well.
56:50
SPEAKER_03: Um, so that's some of the educational components that we had to have with some of the legislators that are putting some of these bills through because they were just misinformed.
56:58
SPEAKER_03: I there was one legislator that uh was explaining to me that well, Texas DPS stopped using Chinese platforms two years ago.
57:05
SPEAKER_03: I'm like, I'm flying NCAA Final Four tomorrow, and they're flying nothing but DJI platforms.
57:10
SPEAKER_03: So um in an I'll tell.
57:13
SPEAKER_03: But um yeah, there's just a there's a high component of misinformation and education that needs to happen, and that's where it's important to get with some of these associations, like Law Enforcement Drone Association, which is I'm a board member of, and or uh drone responders is another really good organization out there uh just to help get educated on what these systems are, what they do, where's some of the misinformation, and what's the reality.
57:37
SPEAKER_08: And and in the event that that legislation would have passed, or in some states that it has when you say devastating, it's because the the ugly fact that we have to admit is if you ban DGI and some of the better platforms, there's not a lot of great options.
57:56
SPEAKER_03: No, that that that was unfortunately you're you're right.
58:00
SPEAKER_03: There's not.
58:01
SPEAKER_03: Um there are platforms that I wish would have a little bit more capabilities.
58:04
SPEAKER_03: Like, I mean, don't get me wrong, I'm a red-blooded American just like anybody else.
58:08
SPEAKER_03: I would love an American-made product to be as capable and affordable as DJI.
58:13
SPEAKER_03: If that was the case, we would we would probably transition in a heartbeat, but um, they're just not right there right now.
58:18
SPEAKER_03: And and there's there's a lot of factors that come into that, right?
58:21
SPEAKER_03: Like China can can manufacture things at a much cheaper rate than we can right now.
58:25
SPEAKER_03: Um there's scalability, there's a lot of things that go into that.
58:29
SPEAKER_03: But um we all would love to fly an American-made product if there was one that was as capable and as affordable.
58:35
SPEAKER_08: Shout out Elon Musk.
58:37
unknown: Yeah.
58:39
SPEAKER_03: Please and thank you.
58:40
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
58:41
SPEAKER_03: Um But yeah, I mean, that's that's one of the bigger challenges that we have.
58:45
SPEAKER_03: Um, but it would be catastrophic.
58:47
SPEAKER_03: And and I hate to liken it to this, but um, I had one individual um say, you know, well, do you want China to be able to just turn off all your drones and uh you know at any given time?
58:58
SPEAKER_03: And that's just not a reality.
58:59
SPEAKER_03: They don't have the ability to do that.
59:01
SPEAKER_03: Um but I argued back, I said, well, by you banning these drones, you're killing people today because on what might happen down the road.
59:08
SPEAKER_03: Because if I can't put a drone in the air to safeguard my officers, to safeguard my civilians that I'm trying to rescue.
59:14
SPEAKER_03: Autistic kids.
59:15
SPEAKER_03: Autistic kids in near lakes, they will die.
59:17
SPEAKER_03: And that's the reality of it.
59:20
SPEAKER_06: I see a I see a KO drone coming in.
59:24
SPEAKER_06: The car and oak braid drone in the future.
59:27
SPEAKER_06: I don't know about that.
59:28
SPEAKER_06: I don't know for that smart.
59:29
SPEAKER_06: With the all's technology with the all's technology and Tyler's money, it can happen.
59:35
SPEAKER_06: What?
59:35
SPEAKER_06: No, no, maybe Elon can jump on that one.
59:38
SPEAKER_04: That retirement money.
59:40
SPEAKER_06: Yeah.
59:40
SPEAKER_04: Well, no, listen to your podcast.
59:42
SPEAKER_06: Shit.
59:43
SPEAKER_06: Yeah.
59:43
SPEAKER_06: I ain't on Joe Rogan here.
59:45
SPEAKER_06: I'd have to bring Clint on.
59:46
SPEAKER_06: Hey, we could have Clint's face on the side.
59:49
SPEAKER_07: I like it.
59:50
SPEAKER_07: I like it.
59:51
SPEAKER_07: It would sell.
59:51
SPEAKER_07: Yeah, it would.
59:52
SPEAKER_08: Yeah.
59:52
SPEAKER_07: I'd buy that.
59:53
SPEAKER_07: On the side of the drone.
59:54
SPEAKER_07: Yeah.
59:54
SPEAKER_07: Yeah, that would scare the hell of a suspect when you flew it into the house.
59:57
SPEAKER_07: Intimidation factors.
59:59
SPEAKER_07: Get that ugly thing.
1:00:01
SPEAKER_06: Absolutely.
1:00:02
SPEAKER_06: Well, guys, man, this has been a pretty cool episode.
1:00:05
SPEAKER_06: Again, I think this is the future of law enforcement.
1:00:07
SPEAKER_06: And I think that uh honestly, well, obviously, we're saving lives.
1:00:10
SPEAKER_06: Uh, but it's also the safety of law enforcement, too.
1:00:12
SPEAKER_06: I mean, we're flying these in the houses.
1:00:14
SPEAKER_06: Uh, you're flying these with stacks of law enforcement with tactical situations.
1:00:17
SPEAKER_06: Uh, we're saving autistic children.
1:00:20
SPEAKER_06: Uh, you know, I mean, this this is the future of uh of our profession.
1:00:23
SPEAKER_06: And uh, you know, kudos to you guys for taking uh the initiative uh, you know, with Perry Land in 2017.
1:00:30
SPEAKER_06: Uh again, I it was it was interesting to me.
1:00:32
SPEAKER_06: I called him right after uh the first four hours.
1:00:34
SPEAKER_06: Number one, I was scared shitless because I had no idea it was gonna be that in depth.
1:00:38
SPEAKER_06: I thought it was gonna be some badass drone class beginning to fly around.
1:00:42
SPEAKER_06: I called him and I was like, hey bro, this is uh this is way more in depth than what I I thought.
1:00:46
SPEAKER_06: So it really did scare me.
1:00:48
SPEAKER_06: I was like, hey, can I can I come home?
1:00:50
SPEAKER_06: Yeah, we've ordered drones for M.
1:00:53
unknown: Yeah.
1:00:53
SPEAKER_06: Yeah, it was way more in depth than what I I anticipated.
1:00:56
SPEAKER_06: So Clinton, you got anything else?
1:00:58
SPEAKER_08: Um I think it's cool that you guys are the first in the country to have the certification that you do.
1:01:06
SPEAKER_08: Um Dallas SWAT years ago when the Dallas five um were killed on 7-7 was the first American law enforcement agency to utilize a robot to deploy an explosive ice device downrange, um which I never thought we would send a suicide bomb downrange to to stop a suspect, but I'm proud that happened in Texas.
1:01:30
SPEAKER_08: I'm proud to get to sit down and visit with you guys doing something that's a first in our country, and it's happening here in Texas.
1:01:38
SPEAKER_08: And if we don't continue to think outside the box, especially with a recruiting and retention crisis, and you talked about it being a force multiplier when your staffing's down 30 or 40 percent, and I can pop that in the air and maybe save the few guys I have left from getting killed, that's huge.
1:01:56
SPEAKER_08: Right.
1:01:57
SPEAKER_08: And anybody with any sense should be considering it their department as he said earlier, five or ten man department has ten thousand dollars to be able to save ch save lives, protect um find stolen vehicles, but more importantly, those autistic kids or or those situations at night.
1:02:18
SPEAKER_08: It's huge, man.
1:02:19
SPEAKER_08: It's not even it shouldn't even be considered.
1:02:21
SPEAKER_08: Right.
1:02:22
SPEAKER_08: I agree.
1:02:23
SPEAKER_08: You got anything else?
1:02:25
SPEAKER_03: Um do you want to talk a little bit about training y'all offer?
1:02:29
SPEAKER_03: Uh we offer a 107 class.
1:02:33
unknown: Yeah.
1:02:33
SPEAKER_04: Now I can tell you how good it is.
1:02:35
SPEAKER_04: Well, it it it was scary at first.
1:02:38
SPEAKER_06: It was scary at first.
1:02:39
SPEAKER_06: I'm not the product of a success, but but it was a it was a really good class.
1:02:42
SPEAKER_04: I'm pretty sure I warned you when you came in the door.
1:02:43
SPEAKER_04: You did, you did.
1:02:44
SPEAKER_04: This is a this is not a law enforcement class.
1:02:46
SPEAKER_04: This is a uh this is the FAA class.
1:02:48
SPEAKER_04: You're going to learn way more than you are.
1:02:50
SPEAKER_06: You are how many how many questions are you shy of actually getting your pilot license?
1:02:53
SPEAKER_06: 20?
1:02:54
SPEAKER_06: 40?
1:02:54
SPEAKER_06: 40?
1:02:55
SPEAKER_04: 40 questions shy of getting actual pilots license.
1:02:56
SPEAKER_04: Yeah, it's just it ain't no bullshit.
1:02:57
SPEAKER_04: It's just apply this little thing right here.
1:02:59
SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
1:03:00
SPEAKER_08: If any of our listeners have drones for dummy's book, they could loan Tyler.
1:03:04
SPEAKER_08: I need the whole yeah, I need yeah, it's bad.
1:03:07
SPEAKER_04: He's still studying.
1:03:08
SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
1:03:08
SPEAKER_04: Um so we offer a 107 class and then we offer a legal class where we go over case laws and um current laws that are in the books for what we can and can't do with these aircraft.
1:03:20
SPEAKER_08: How would folks find that?
1:03:21
SPEAKER_08: How would they find you to get a hold of that training?
1:03:23
SPEAKER_04: Uh go to uh the city of Paraland uh PDFH or go to PPD training.elements LMS.
1:03:31
SPEAKER_06: Yep.
1:03:31
SPEAKER_06: Yep.
1:03:32
SPEAKER_06: Hey, and their training facility was phenomenal on their on their website.
1:03:35
SPEAKER_06: It was legit.
1:03:35
SPEAKER_06: I mean their the whole training experience at Paraland PD was uh was phenomenal.
1:03:39
SPEAKER_08: And how would they find uh if somebody was wanting to dip their toe in and and utilize drone sense, how would they find you?
1:03:46
SPEAKER_03: You can just go to drone sense.com.
1:03:48
SPEAKER_03: Uh I'm not hard to find.
1:03:49
SPEAKER_03: I'm everywhere.
1:03:50
SPEAKER_03: Um but yeah, you can go to dronesense.com.
1:03:53
SPEAKER_03: Uh you can fill out an info sheet on that, and one of our uh representatives will get in touch with you.
1:03:57
SPEAKER_03: More than likely, I'll be doing the uh the demo on there so you'll get to see me again and talk about that.
1:04:01
SPEAKER_03: Uh so we do a bunch of different trainings online for that, as well as if you want to fly a drone uh remotely, you'll be able to fly exactly where you're sitting, and you'll be flying a drone in Michigan, uh, which is a lot of fun.
1:04:12
SPEAKER_03: So yeah.
1:04:14
SPEAKER_03: Uh that's cool.
1:04:15
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, it is.
1:04:15
SPEAKER_03: It's a lot of fun.
1:04:16
SPEAKER_03: It's a lot of fun.
1:04:17
SPEAKER_03: Uh, but yeah, we can get you trials set up so that y'all can give it a shot and see what y'all think and see if it's gonna best suit uh your agency.
1:04:24
SPEAKER_06: Gio, how can they find you?
1:04:26
SPEAKER_06: Well, it's not through uh 107 yet.
1:04:30
SPEAKER_06: Hopefully when I pass that class.
1:04:32
SPEAKER_06: Yeah.
1:04:33
SPEAKER_06: Well, hey, we always end the show with uh some rapid fire questions.
1:04:36
SPEAKER_06: I'm gonna let Clint finish it off because I always screw it up and I don't want to be accused of messing it up intentionally because we have kind of a a uh competition going on of a certain question.
1:04:45
SPEAKER_08: So it's not even close.
1:04:47
SPEAKER_06: Oh no, it is.
1:04:48
SPEAKER_08: It is best cop movie or favorite line from a cop movie?
1:04:54
SPEAKER_04: Uh I I might say a TV show, and I grew up watching chips.
1:04:58
SPEAKER_02: Chips, yep.
1:04:59
SPEAKER_02: Punch or John, paunch, paunch.
1:05:02
SPEAKER_02: There you go.
1:05:02
SPEAKER_02: Good one.
1:05:03
SPEAKER_02: I'm gonna bring it right back to drones, and I'm gonna say uh I'm a peacock, you gotta let me fly.
1:05:06
SPEAKER_02: Yes, yes, that's a good one.
1:05:08
SPEAKER_02: That's that's probably the most popular movie.
1:05:10
SPEAKER_08: Yeah, love it on here.
1:05:13
SPEAKER_08: Yeah.
1:05:13
SPEAKER_08: Um favorite caprice.
1:05:18
SPEAKER_08: No, cop car.
1:05:20
SPEAKER_08: Sorry.
1:05:21
SPEAKER_08: Spoiler alert.
1:05:23
SPEAKER_08: Favorite, favorite patrol car of all time that you've driven or that you're a fan of?
1:05:29
SPEAKER_08: Crombig.
1:05:31
SPEAKER_03: My man.
1:05:31
SPEAKER_03: Yeah, the crown veg was by far the most fun vehicle.
1:05:34
SPEAKER_03: So we went from the Crown Vic to the old Tahoe, new Tahoe, and then the new explorers, and we enjoyed the Crown Vicks.
1:05:39
SPEAKER_04: You never wondered if your friends were in a pursuit when they got on the radio with Crown Vic.
1:05:42
SPEAKER_04: That's right.
1:05:43
SPEAKER_06: Because you could hear it, that thing was a beast.
1:05:46
SPEAKER_06: Oh, click clicking in the show now.
1:05:48
SPEAKER_05: Made my heart.
1:05:49
SPEAKER_05: Oh, warm with my heart.
1:05:51
SPEAKER_05: All right, favorite drink, adult beverage.
1:05:53
SPEAKER_05: I'll I'll I got it from here.
1:05:57
SPEAKER_04: Uh right now, whistle pig.
1:05:58
SPEAKER_04: Uh bourbon.
1:06:00
SPEAKER_07: Whistle pig?
1:06:01
SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
1:06:01
SPEAKER_04: I never heard of that.
1:06:02
SPEAKER_07: Uh is it deep on ice?
1:06:05
SPEAKER_07: On ice.
1:06:06
SPEAKER_07: On ice, yeah.
1:06:08
SPEAKER_03: I like a bourbon, uh bullet bourbon, old fashioned.
1:06:13
SPEAKER_03: That's my goal too.
1:06:14
SPEAKER_07: Bullet regular or bullet ride?
1:06:16
SPEAKER_07: Right.
1:06:16
SPEAKER_07: Right.
1:06:17
SPEAKER_07: This is foreign to me.
1:06:18
SPEAKER_03: I don't know what that is.
1:06:20
SPEAKER_03: I'll give you another shout out.
1:06:21
SPEAKER_03: If you go to the Stella Hotel down by Teaks, they may they have a uh speakeasy in there, and they have some of the best old fashions I've ever had.
1:06:28
SPEAKER_03: Really?
1:06:28
SPEAKER_03: Yes.
1:06:30
SPEAKER_07: Yeah.
1:06:31
SPEAKER_07: Get him one with an Angel Zenvy in it.
1:06:34
SPEAKER_07: Yes.
1:06:34
SPEAKER_07: Don't try Angel's Envy.
1:06:35
SPEAKER_07: I'll have to tell you that story off camera.
1:06:40
SPEAKER_07: It's a good one.
1:06:40
SPEAKER_07: Have that experience.
1:06:41
SPEAKER_06: Oh God.
1:06:42
SPEAKER_06: Yeah, it's it's not good.
1:06:44
SPEAKER_06: Well, hey, we're wrapping things up here at the Blue Grit.
1:06:46
SPEAKER_06: Uh, you guys stay safe out there.
1:06:48
SPEAKER_06: It's getting pretty crazy.
1:06:49
SPEAKER_06: It's uh getting pretty hot outside with summertime, so you know what that means.
1:06:52
SPEAKER_06: High call volumes and uh crazy law enforcement days ahead.
1:06:56
SPEAKER_08: So reach out if you don't have a drone, reach out to one of these guys.
1:07:00
SPEAKER_08: Uh man, it's the wave of the future.
1:07:02
SPEAKER_08: And saving officers' lives, saving citizens' lives, and having eyes in the sky, man.
1:07:07
SPEAKER_08: You can't uh can't go wrong.
1:07:11
SPEAKER_06: Nope, nope.
1:07:12
SPEAKER_06: Conference is open, registration's open, so you guys don't miss out.
1:07:15
SPEAKER_06: July 21st to 23rd.
1:07:17
SPEAKER_06: Maybe we'll get to see some drone activity.
1:07:20
SPEAKER_02: I'll be able to make that happen.
1:07:21
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, absolutely.
1:07:22
SPEAKER_02: Oh, hell yeah.
1:07:23
SPEAKER_08: That'd be pretty cool.
1:07:24
SPEAKER_08: High Regency Reunion Tower, the big ball in Dallas.
1:07:28
SPEAKER_08: It's a conference.
1:07:28
SPEAKER_08: We'll see you there.
1:07:29
SPEAKER_06: Absolutely.
1:07:30
SPEAKER_06: You guys stay safe as always.
1:07:31
SPEAKER_06: May God bless you, and may God bless Texas.
1:07:33
SPEAKER_06: We're out.