First Germany than England and now America who has drones that will assist the police…raise your hands if you want to be the next drone-city!
The Alameda County Sheriff’s Department is hoping to become one of the handful of local law enforcement agencies that have received federal clearance to use unmanned aerial drones to fight crime, a goal that already is arousing concerns among privacy advocates.
Civil liberties and privacy groups revealed Thursday that Sheriff Greg Ahern is seeking Department of Homeland Security funding to buy a small remote-controlled drone called a Dragon Fly. If the money comes through and the Federal Aviation Administration permits the department to test the device, Alameda would be the first public safety agency in California to deploy technology first developed for spying on U.S. enemies overseas.
A memo that one of Ahern’s captains prepared over the summer, obtained by the Freedom of Information Act web site MuckRock, says the drone would be equipped with a long-distance camera, live video downlink and infrared sensors that could be used for monitoring bomb threats, fires, unruly crowds, search and rescue operations, and marijuana grows.
Only four local law enforcement agencies in the United States have received FAA approval to train officers, deputies and volunteer pilots to operate aerial drones, according to Don Roby, a police captain in Baltimore County, Maryland who chairs the aviation committee of the International Association of Chiefs of Police. They are in Miami, Seattle, Mesa County, Colo., and Arlington, Texas, although only the Colorado agency has permission to use them routinely, Roby said.
“There is a lot of interest in it, but more people are taking a wait-and-see-attitude,” he said.
Congress has ordered the FAA to develop safely regulations that would allow both public agencies and commercial operators to fly unmanned aircraft by 2015.
Ahern’s spokesman, Sgt. J.D. Nelson, told the San Francisco Chronicle (http://bit.ly/TiWMXv ) that the Dragon Fly model the department tested costs between $50,000 and $100,000 but would save money now spent on spent on sending helicopters into the sky.
The reconnaissance drone, the future police forces?