Drones for Hazardous Materials Response and Detection: Don't let your drone be a passive observer. Make it an active participant in the mitigation of your hazardous materials incident.

Don't let your drone be a passive observer. Make it an active participant in the mitigation of your hazardous materials incident. Often the initial information provided to responders by bystanders and 911 callers is erroneous. This class teaches the student the techniques and procedures to safely use drones in IDLH environments to rapidly assess the extent of the Haz Mat scene and give the incident commander good quality actionable intel to base decisions upon. Presenters will pass along the knowledge they have acquired from their real world use of drones on actual hazardous materials incidents. The presenters will share their findings from their testing of drones for in flammable atmospheres and use in IDLH environments and describe how they use drones to rapidly access the hot zone, assess chemical threats and limit responder exposure. Students will be shown how to use drones for plume tracking, hazard identification, air sampling, triage, radiation detection, victim rescue and ways to accomplish other tactical objectives. The lessons learned are especially applicable to transportation incidents involving Hazardous Materials which can happen anywhere and often occur in locations that have limited access yet still threaten local populations and the environment. They can also happen in densely populated areas where getting a complete overview of the magnitude of the event is almost impossible for the incident commander. Haz Mat responders do not have the luxury of having a pre-plan for their transportation incident. Drones help the Haz Mat responders overcome these unique challenges that transportation emergencies present by demonstrating how drones can provide decision makers with more accurate and actionable information in 15 minutes than humans in Chemical PPE on foot can provide in 2 hours. This class is all classroom using a power point presentation augmented with videos of real world drone response to haz mat incidents and drone testing. It is intended to show the students how to use their drones for hazardous materials incidents and will touch on but not focus on the various regulations that apply to drone programs. The presenters will also share their experiences with managing and justifying the existence of a drone program along with the equipment requirements needed for real world incidents.