MISSION PROFILE For the Birds
PILOT REPORT
Wildlife conservation is one use for small, civil uncrewed aircraft systems (UAS) that is seldom listed among the marquee applications for the technology, such orthomosaic mapping, industrial inspection, and emergency response, to name a few, yet it has the potential to make significant contributions to environmental preservation.
That’s what I learned when June Stephens, an ornithologist submitting a paper to the national conference of the North American Ornithology Society, contacted me about using a drone to document an osprey nest. This seemed like a straight-forward mission I could knock out in less than an hour of flying, but that was before she explained that she wanted to build a 3D model of the nest and, by the way, the birds had installed radio jamming equipment around their home.
CAN YOU HEAR ME NOW?
Okay, so the birds didn’t actually rig up jammers around their nest, but they did the next best thing: they build it right on top of a cell phone tower. Prior to this assignment, I had never flown a drone near a cell tower—a deliberate choice on my part. I knew that UAS were used to conduct tower inspections, but I wasn't aware if any special equipment or precautions were
