Drone Search of Airport for Lost Cockatiel

12/12/20 Aerial search by drone for Peety, the lost Cockatiel, who escaped from her home just across the street several days prior and was last seen flying confused over the airport. I check the rooftops of the hangars and some adjacent businesses with rear storage yards that are hard to see or access by ground or normal means. The search is being conducted in the Jacksboro Hwy/Kickapoo airport area. There is at time of this posting a $550 reward for Peety's safe return. The immediate airspace of this airport is a restricted/No Fly Zone for dones unless authorized. This flight was authorized in-app by FAA and additionally, the FBO was notified and clearance was obtained from the airport administrator prior. I even notified the Cessna pilot who was about to do his pre-flight. It turned out that he is a friend of the girl who lost her bird and was already aware of the search being conducted in the area, as were the airport staff and other aircraft owners I encountered, and all of whom were very nice and supportive. As a former pilot and aircraft owner myself, I can tell you I was in fact shocked that no one actually had a problem with what I was doing and that permission was even granted to fly on airport property. But after I spoke to the administrator and explained my credentials, experience, and familiarity with aircraft operations, and told him what my operating altitiude limit would be and that I would bring the drone down if anyone entered the pattern just to avoid confusion, he was fine with it so long as I had the FAA clearance. It's one thing to just have the clearance, but out of courtesy and due diligence in communicating for safety, it's also wise to let the FBO (airport operations) themselves know what you're going to be doing in the area, even though this is an uncontrolled airport (no tower). These days the FAA clearance is obtained per instance and almost instantly via request through the drone app. Your contact info and device ID/hardware info, etc are recorded and a GPS log of your flight is stored in the cloud by DJI. The drone would not even take off without an internet connection so as to update the Fly Safe database prior to that, and obtain the clearance in order to unlock the geo-fencing restriction for this zone/airspace. In the beginning of the video you can see in the upper left of the screen where the drone is indicating that it cannot take off. This is not a recommendation. It's literally preventing me from arming the motors and spinning the blades until it gets a network connection and authorization is given to take off.Show more

Drone used is a DJI Mavic Pro, with a number of hardward and software safety features, including GPS guidance from as many as 19 satellites at once, automatic Return To Home on loss of signal/low power, forward and downward facing collision avoidance sensors, 5 position sensing cameras (main+2 forward+2 ventral), 2 ventral sonars, 2 accelerometers, 2 gyroscopes, and 2 magnetic compasses. It is the most reliable and stable thing I've ever flown.

On a side note, in the early part of the video, you can see some people with a toddler in the opposite hangar, and throughout my flight I could hear the father replying to the little boy that he could stay safely away from me and just watch. Indicating that the little boy wanted to come over closer. I also heard him tell the boy "No, it's not really a toy. I don't think he's going to let you fly it. It looks expensive.". The boy was well behaved and not pouting or anything. He was just in awe of it and curious. So just before I landed, in preparation to move to another part of hangar row, I called the little boy over and as I held the controller, I told him which stick to push to make it fly forward. Then I had him fly it in reverse back over us. And then I had him pull the "collective" stick down to make it land. And that made him and his parents happy. ^_^ His father (I'm assuming) thanked me and expressed that he rightly didn't think I was going to let the little boy actually fly it, which would normally be a very reasonable thing to assume. Even though this is an older first Gen Mavic Pro (1) manufactured in 2017 (which in drone tech is obsolescent compared to what's new at the present time), it would still cost nearly $1000 to replace it in its nearly new condition. But, I explained to him that because this drone is so expensive, that comes with many redundant safety features, and it is very stable and has altitude and position hold, and also the collision avoidance sensors will prevent the drone from flying into any obstacle, at least in front or below of it. As I told him, I'm more comfortable letting a completely inexperienced person fly the Mavic Pro than the cheaper Wal Mart toy drone I have, because the cheaper one you WOULD crash quickly if you're not experienced. You really have to be TRYING to crash the Mavic Pro in order to do so. (The exception is bird strikes/other moving objects striking the drone, flying in low light when the visual sensors don't work, or wires...which the collision avoidance sensors have a hard time seeing until it's too late).