Warren County law enforcement agencies are getting new investigative tools, specifically thermal drones, to assist with locating missing people and tracking fugitives.
The Wright City Police Department recently acquired one of the unmanned aerial vehicles, while the Truesdale Board of Aldermen approved a purchase of one for their city’s police department at their meeting Wednesday, Oct. 14.
Truesdale Police Chief Casey Doyle said he got quotes for drones from three different companies: Skydio, Autel Robotics, and DJI.
All three drones can see heat signatures both during the day and at night. The Autel drone would cost $9,399 and the DJI drone was $12,399, Doyle said, while the Skydio drone would cost significantly more.
“The initial cost is $25,471 and it requires a five-year contract for services and software, that’s $5,000 a year, so it’s almost $60,000 for the five-year life cycle of the drone,” he said.
Although one advantage of Skydio would be that the company is U.S.-based, after reviewing the three quotes, Doyle recommended the DJI drone. “It’s middle of the road; it’s not going to cost us $60,000 over five years,” he said.
“The only thing I would say, just so that you guys are aware, is our government’s current stance on foreign-made drones is that they could pose a potential security risk, although in the last five years they have not presented any evidence of those facts,” he added.
The Department of Justice has published a “blue list” of approved drones, including Skydio products. “They’re all American-made, and they’re two or three times the price, and half the quality,” Doyle said of the DOJ’s list of approved drones.
The DJI Matrice 4TD drone, on the other hand, has many functions that make it useful to the police department, he said.
“It has a complete weather-proof rating. You can fly it in high winds, you can fly it in a downpour. Obviously, you can’t submerge it in water, but it runs in sub-zero temperatures or extreme heat,” Doyle said, adding that it has a zoom feature that is “just wild,” allowing a drone operator to read a license plate from 1,000 feet away.
“It comes with four batteries. I think it’s a 50-minute flight time per battery and it goes 60 miles per hour. It has a lot of capabilities, and to be honest, it just beats out these other companies by huge margins,” he said, adding that the DJI drone purchase would be a one-time fee without any service contract.
The DJI drone not being on the “blue list” does not currently prohibit police departments from using it.
“I mean, there is a risk that at some point they may say ‘Hey, we don’t like these drones anymore and you can’t fly them,’” Doyle said, “but I don’t want to lose the option to have the capability to save lives or apprehend a dangerous felon in the meantime. But I also don’t want to spend $60,000 over the next five years doing so.”
Wright City police currently have two drones made for flying indoors, which Truesdale can request if needed, Doyle said, although these have limited capabilities that do not include thermal imaging.
“It’s specific just to that work, inside the house if there’s a search warrant, or it’s some kind of structure that you want to put eyes on before you put people in there,” Doyle said.
There are also many situations, however, where thermal capabilities can greatly assist police, he added.
“To give an example, if you have to search a corn field at night that’s 100 acres, it takes a lot of people to get in there and do that on foot,” he said, “or you can just set up a small command post, put a drone in the air, and it’s pretty easy to find a heat signature.”
Truesdale aldermen approved the DJI drone purchase unanimously. DJI, a Chinese company, is also the manufacturer of a used drone that the Wright City Police Department recently purchased from the Warren County Sheriff’s Department for $4,000.
While this DJI Matrice 4T has thermal imaging capability like the 4TD drone that Truesdale is purchasing, it is not waterproof and has less battery life, at around 30 to 35 minutes rather than 50.
“The primary purpose is to help locate people that are in need of law enforcement services or medical services,” Wright City Police Lt. Aaron Sutton said, “or if they’re just running from the police.”
Both Doyle and Sutton noted that police are required to follow extensive rules when flying drones.
“You can’t just fly over people’s homes and look in their backyards without a search warrant,” Doyle said. “The only time that changes is if there’s exigent circumstances, an active emergency.”
Conducting drone surveillance without a search warrant is “not something we do,” said Sutton. “We’re very cognizant of people’s Fourth Amendment rights.”
Besides Wright City and Truesdale police, other area law enforcement agencies that have drones include the Warren County Sheriff’s Department and Warrenton Police Department, Sutton said.
“There was a time when only one agency had drones, and I think all or most have drones now,” said Doyle.
In Warren County, the first agency to launch a drone program was not a police department, he noted, but the Wright City Fire Protection District. For at least two years, he added, they were the only local agency with drones.
“I don’t know who came along second, but every agency has kind of jumped onboard and seen the advantages of being able to see heat signatures,” Doyle said.
Wright City Fire Chief Ron MacKnight said that with about seven drones currently operational, the fire protection district still likely has the most of any agency in the county. Advances in technology and decreasing costs, however, have made drones more attractive to a broader range of customers, he added.
“Every agency is going to go that route, and we saw that back about 10 years ago at Wright City Fire, and we try to pride ourselves on being up to par with technology and changes in the industry, and we saw this coming so we jumped onboard, and I’m proud to say we were the first agency to provide such extensive aerial drone search services,” MacKnight said.
“We wrote the policies, we became licensed, we insured our equipment, we did it the right way, and there were a lot of agencies that looked to us for guidance, and we’re certainly happy to provide that,” he said.
Several Wright City firefighters, MacKnight included, now travel around the country teaching other agencies about drone response and setting up their own drone programs, he added.
“It’s another tool in the toolbox for law enforcement, fire agencies, emergency management, EMS,” MacKnight said. “The great thing about Warren County is we have such a great working relationship with all of our agencies, it really doesn’t matter who is wearing what uniform.”
