Sheriff's Department Seeks to Improve Search and Rescue Operations

MORENO VALLEY >> The Riverside County Sheriff’s Department is responsible for all Search and Rescue (SAR) calls for help within the unincorporated areas of Riverside County. Annually, the Sheriff’s Department responds to 150-170 SAR related incidents. The number of SAR operations continue to increase over the years as the county continues to grow. Over the past few years, the Riverside County Sheriff’s Department has been researching the concept of utilizing Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAV) for SAR operations. UAVs have proven helpful when they were used successfully in life-saving efforts during California fires and Colorado flooding incidents. The Department has entered into a test agreement with Sentera LLC, headquartered in Minnesota, to use their Phoenix aircraft style Unmanned Aerial System during a one year, no cost, evaluation period. Sentera personnel have extensive experience in the development and application of Unmanned Systems, focusing in the areas of agriculture and first responders. Sentera systems exceed all Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) and Department regulations and requirements to be authorized for operation. Government agencies are required to apply for and receive a Certificate of Authorization from the FAA prior to operating UAVs in pre-approved areas. The Riverside County Sheriff’s Department applied for a Certificate, it was approved and is effective March 28, 2016. The Riverside County Sheriff Department's use of UAVs will focus solely on SAR operations where a fixed wing UAV could be deployed quickly to supplement current aviation resources. UAVs may potentially result in quicker life-saving rescues due to their ability to rapidly help search for missing children, lost or injured hikers or people who are listed as “at-risk missing” because of a known medical condition. The Sheriff supports exploring this resource in order to protect lives and is looking forward to this economical one year public-private test partnership with Sentera. The Department hopes that the use of Sentera Phoenix will improve their ability to direct critical life-saving resources towards saving lives during SAR operations, while also providing a significant cost savings for taxpayers.