Speaking at the third annual Drone Focus Conference in Fargo, North Dakota last week, U.S. Sen. John Hoeven (R-ND) said that his state was positioned to take the lead on new developments in Unmanned Aerial Systems (UAS) applications.
Hoeven said that the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) recently gave approval to the Northern Plains UAS test site, which will be the first site in the nation to oversee beyond-line-of-sight operations for high altitude, large unmanned aircraft. The approval, which Hoeven personally worked to secure, will enable companies like General Atomics to train new Predator drone operators out of the Grand Forks Air Force Base.
Beyond-line-of-sight operations utilize on-board cameras to provide operators the ability to avoid various obstacles a UAS might encounter during flight.
“We are advancing UAS operations here in North Dakota unlike anywhere else in the nation,” Hoeven said. “Now that we have secured authorization for beyond-line-of-sight flights, it is vital that federal agencies are able to keep up with the innovations of industry and our state stays on the cutting-edge of UAS applications, including low-altitude beyond-line-of-sight flights and counter UAS operations.”
Hoeven also provided an update on upgrades to the Grand Forks Air Force Base’s DASR-11 digital radar system, based in Hector Field in Fargo, which will help operators track unmanned aircraft so they can fly beyond the sight of a UAS operator.
The senator said these updates will place North Dakota in the lead for product delivery operations, like Amazon’s proposed package delivery service which uses drones to deliver parcels of various sizes.