Drones Are Newest Tool In Austin Police Department's Arsenal

AUSTIN, TEXAS — The Austin Police Department is launching a program whereby drones are used to help monitor fatal traffic crashes throughout the city, with its first public hearing on the program scheduled on Tuesday.

The APD says the program will help trim investigating time in gathering evidence by as much as 80 percent, help reduce traffic at perilous and congested traffic sites and help safeguard officers who otherwise would be at the side of the road assessing wrecks.

A series of public gatherings is scheduled to convey details of the new drone-aided police effort to interested members of the public. The use of quacopter-style drones affixed with surveillance cameras is a growing trend among law enforcement department nationwide, the department has previously explained. Such technology would all but replace ground-level equipment not unlike tools used by land surveyors in measuring distances and achieve mapping through the use of lasers, police suggested.

But such land-surveyor-like equipment takes long to set up and use, sometimes hours. Drones are being seen as a more efficient alternative, police have explained. Drones also would help determine, from a bird's-eye perspective, if an entire road needs to be shut down in the aftermath of an accident, police said. Seeing a crash from the high vantage point yields a more accurate perspective, preventing officers from having to be at the scene — always a dangerous prospect given oncoming traffic amid crash sites — and instead would allow officers to investigate some crash sites from their offices.

We found an interesting video explaining the growing trend among law enforcement in using drones to process accident and crime scenes. While using traditional investigative methods can take hours or even days, drones can help investigators assess hot spots via digital image in 20 minutes to 40 minutes, according to the video primer. Learn more below:

To explain the Austin drone program to members of the public, three explanatory public gatherings have been scheduled in the coming days, the first one to be staged the evening of Tuesday, Aug. 28. Here's the schedule:

• The first public hearing is scheduled Tuesday, Aug. 28, in North Austin at the Westin Hotel at The Domain, 11301 Domain Dr., at 6 p.m.
• The second session is scheduled to take place in South Austin at the police substation located at 404 Ralph Ablanedo Dr., at 6 p.m. on Wednesday, Aug. 29
• The third and final meeting is scheduled in East Austin at 6 p.m. on Wednesday, Sept. 5, at the police substation located at 812 Springdale Rd.

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