Remotely Operated Vehicles for Emergency Response

About the Program

Category: Risk and Emergency Management (Best in Category)

Year: 2018

In early 2016, the York County Department of Fire and Life Safety began investigating the potential use of small Unmanned Aircraft Systems (sUAS) for assisting with the mitigation a various incidents and situations faced during emergency and non-emergency responses. The York-Poquoson Sheriff’s Office was also looking into sUAS and how it could assist with their response to the various calls for service that they are charged with. After learning of each other’s interest in this new technology for public safety use, it was decided that an intergovernmental cooperation and coordination effort could be made to address our shared interest in the integration of sUAS into our operating practice. In the spring of 2016, the York County Department of Fire and Life Safety, along with the York-Poquoson Sheriff’s Office, founded a joint specialized team that utilizes sUAS in an effort to provide enhanced situational awareness and improved mitigation ability for the variety of situations we are tasked with managing in a safe and effective manner. This team, known as the Remotely Operated Vehicles for Emergency Response Team (ROVER Team), provides situational awareness and other tactical mission capabilities during public safety incidents, such as missing persons, hazmat incidents, bomb/explosive incidents, hostile/hostage situations, storm damage assessment, etc. Currently, the team is operational and very active. Not only does the team provide a critical response resource for fire, rescue and law enforcement incidents, they serve to assist other jurisdictions with implementing their own sUAS program.