As a retired fire chief from Charlottesville and a 46 year public safety veteran, Charles Werner knows a thing or two about how necessary it is for public safety workers to have the right tools. Always interested in technology, Charles purchased a DJI Phantom 3 shortly after retiring. At first, Charles said he bought the drone just for fun, but he quickly realized the positive impact it could have in emergencies. In 2016, Charles earned his FAA Part 107 to become a commercially licensed drone pilot.

In 2017, Charles helped the Virginia Department of Emergency Management implement a drone program. He also began traveling around the country to encourage and educate other public safety organizations about drone programs. After seeing just how many public safety organizations were adopting drone programs, Charles noticed a major flaw. There was a gap in the communication between what agencies had a drone program and those without one looking to share support. In April of 2019, Charles founded the nonprofit organization DroneResponders to fill this gap. As Charles explains, “DroneResponders is a grassroots organization that is designed to form a nationwide network of public safety remote pilots and public safety drone programs to communicate, coordinate, and collaborate between and with each other. Additionally, it serves as a portal or repository of public safety drone documents.”

One of the functions that DroneResponders provides is a comprehensive list of public safety agencies with a drone program. DroneResponders created an interactive dashboard map containing information from 1,030 (and growing) public safety agencies around the world that use drones. By clicking on one of the map’s icons, a sidebar opens up to reveal the name, location, and type of agency. The menu further lists when that specific agency began the drone program, how many drones and pilots the agency has, what types of drones they use, and details on the payload and capability option the drones can be used for.

“Our goal is to establish a collaborative network that can share best practices, lessons learned, regulatory updates, safety issues, facilitate training opportunities, as well as identify the location and program capabilities,” Charles said. “This has already helped some agencies to identify programs near them that they were not previously aware of and started discussions of assistance and/or developing regional teams.” DroneResponders has gone on to join forces with the Florida Department of Safety to develop a statewide program called The Florida Public Safety Coordination Group. This program will coordinate an emergency drone framework that will assist public safety agencies in any emergencies. DroneResponders has a similar operation going with the Northeast UAS Airspace Integration Research to help public safety agencies across New York conceive drone programs.

While the drone dashboard map is filled with cross agency support, and DroneResponders continues to help agencies institute drone programs, Charles knows there is still more to be done. Already, he sees drones used in countless ways to do good. Over the next 10 years, Charles predicts that drones will be indispensable for emergency workers. With DroneResponders, he hopes to be the bridge linking drone possibilities to the people who need them.

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