Aeryon Doubles Success in Police Drone Sector

A Canadian drone company already a leader in police-driven UAV tech scored two victories recently that will no doubt launch it higher into the growing public-safety sector.

Last week, Aeryon Labs unveiled an on-site option for its cloud-based, real-time video/data streaming platform, AeryonLive. The new system add-on will allow public-safety agencies to operate drones without violating government data-ownership policies that forbid cloud-based telemetry.

According to an Aeryon press release, the system will transmit data and video across a “secure, reliable bonded cellular network connection” that can stream low-latency video “under five seconds glass-to-glass.” The platform can be used with the company’s flagship UAV, the SkyRanger, as well as DJI products.

In more good news for the company, police in Barrie, Ont. used an Aeryon SkyRanger last month to help track down a suspect wanted on several counts of theft. Using the SkyRanger to give them a bird’s-eye view, the police easily located the 43-year-old fugitive in a clinic parking lot.

Earlier that week, the police force launched the drone to help locate an injured woman following a jet-ski accident near Niagara Falls.

“It’s definitely helpful if you are searching for someone, or evidence,” Barrie Police Constable Nicole Rodgers said in a newspaper interview. “When you’re getting a wider view of an area, where maybe there might be evidence or items that were maybe ditched during a foot pursuit.”

The company’s recent success continues to cement Aeryon’s relationship with law enforcement.  In 2014, the company announced that the Michigan State Police had agreed to standardize its statewide drone deployment with Aeryon’s SkyRanger quadcopter models.

In October, Microsoft announced inclusion of SkyRanger in its Advanced Patrol Platform car for use by law

During a workshop earlier this year, Aeryon taught local police and fire departments the basics of drone deployment in Ohio. In March, the British National Police Chiefs’ Council completed a trial with SkyRangers in Surrey and Sussex. “You could send up the drone and use the video link before making a decision how to proceed,” Steve Barry of the NPCC said.