One of the biggest benefits of drones is their ability to be used in emergency situations. First responders have used drones to assess these situations, locate disaster victims, and deliver life-saving tools. For the first time, DJI is releasing a report on how its drones have been used in life-threatening situations.
According to the report, drones have helped remove at least 59 people from life-threatening conditions in 18 separate incidents around the globe. DJI collected this information via news reports from 2013. Of the 59 saved, 38 were saved in just the last 10 month, showing an increase of drones for emergency response, according to the report.
“The clear conclusion is that drones are regularly saving lives around the world. This is occurring even though professional rescue crews are just beginning to adopt UAS technology, and in many cases are relying on bystanders or volunteers to provide life-saving assistance,” according to the report. “DJI is at the forefront in efforts to develop best practices and optimal standards for firefighters, rescue services and other first responders to integrate drones into their command protocols. As these efforts continue, we expect the number of lives saved by drones to continue to grow.”
Other findings include: drones are saving about one life a week on average; 20 of the lives saved were by civilians using drones; 31 were saving during floods; 19 were missing people found on land; and 9 were people rescued from non-flooded water environments.
