DRONERESPONDERS and Media Photographers Promote UAV Safety

It’s been a great week for DRONERESPONDERS.

The alliance, billed as “the world’s fastest growing non-profit program supporting public safety UAS,” is partnering with the National Press Photographers Association. The collaboration will promote safety guidelines between members of the media and first responders.

“We are seeing both news media and public safety organizations rapidly adopting drones for use in their everyday operations,” NPPA General Counsel Mickey Osterreicher said. The duo made the announcement during the Drone Journalism Leadership Summit at the Craig Newmark Graduate School of Journalism at CUNY on Thursday.

“Our partnership with DRONERESPONDERS will focus on providing education for, and enhancing communication between, both groups to ensure a safe and productive environment for flight operations.”

Earlier this week, the Airborne International Response Team – DRONERESPONDERS sponsoring group – announced an inaugural Global Public Safety UAS Summit and Major Cities Meeting  to be held at the Association for Unmanned Vehicle Systems International XPONENTIAL 2020.

“It’s all about establishing communication protocols and ensuring that all remote pilots are operating from the same script with an extreme focus on safety,” DRONERESPONDERS Director Charles Werner, said.

“We believe NPPA represents an ideal partner for DRONERESPONDERS to work with in bridging the gap between public safety and news gathering operations.”

Last month, the two groups partnered with several media groups to co-host a kickoff event in Las Vegas. The event commemorated National Drone Safety Awareness Week. The week-long series of events coordinated by the FAA and the Department of Transportation helped educate the public about drone safety.

“It’s really about building trust,” Osterreicher said.  “Manned public safety aircraft pilots and news helicopter pilots know each other and communicate freely in the NAS over incident scenes.  We want to create the same environment for remote pilots operating drones.”

“At the end of the day, each side has a job they need to do,” Werner added.

“The most important thing is that the jobs get done safely and effectively.   That requires communication and cooperation.”