Two N.C. Department of Transportation programs combined to\nbe the first in the nation to launch an innovative technology pilot with their\nsafety service patrol that should improve safety on North Carolina roadways.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The statewide Incident Management Assistance Patrol (IMAP<\/a>) program and the Division of Aviation’s Unmanned Aircraft System (UAS) program recently helped develop and deploy the operation of tethered drones from select IMAP vehicles. This helps responders assess incidents, provide situational awareness to the NCDOT Statewide Transportation Operations Center (STOC) and Traffic Management centers (TMCs) and assist with overall traffic management of the incidents. The deployment of this technology was realized as a result of a federal innovation grant received in 2020.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cAlong our interstates, where our IMAP patrols operate,\nthere are gaps in camera coverage, so we don’t have perfect situational\nawareness,” said State Traffic Operations Engineer Dominic Ciaramitaro.\n\u201cOur tethered drones will help us fill those gaps.” <\/p>\n\n\n\n Traditionally, traffic operations staff views video feeds at\nthe STOC\/TMC through traffic cameras or they receive reports from responders in\nthe field. Tethered drones safely offer\nanother method to provide more information in real time, with higher quality\nvideo, and for long periods of time. <\/p>\n\n\n\n IMAP trucks are equipped with multiple specialized tools to\nassist stranded motorists or scene management with first responders. The\ntethered drones will be just one more resource in their toolkit. The drone can\nfly up to 150 feet to take video and livestream it to the STOC\/regional TMC as\nwell as to emergency management personnel at the incident. This instant\ninformation can provide a safer environment for those on scene or approaching\nan incident and allow the centers to better manage traffic and share more accurate\ntraveler information to the public. The systems are highly portable and can be\nquickly launched and recovered.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The IMAP team has two tethered drone systems they will be\ntesting as part of the pilot. The UAS program and IMAP program team trained the\nfirst IMAP supervisor in January. IMAP used it within days of the training to\nsurvey a crash near the U.S. 13 and Interstate 95 interchange in Fayetteville\nas its first operation in the field. The drone was in the air for nearly five\ncontinuous hours.<\/p>\n\n\n\n IMAP is managed through the divisions and is supported\nstatewide by NCDOT’s Traffic Operations section, which is part of the\nTransportation Systems Management and Operations unit. The Division of Aviation\nadvised and supported the unit with procuring, testing and training of the\ntethered drone systems as part of its work to expand beneficial drone use\nacross NCDOT. The NCDOT’s Traffic Operations section will consider future\ndeployment of tethered drones upon completion of the pilot’s evaluation. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Please see video from the final training here<\/a> and see more of the Fotokite drone in action here.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Two N.C. Department of Transportation programs combined to be the first in the nation to launch an innovative technology pilot with their safety service patrol that should improve safety on North Carolina roadways. The statewide Incident Management Assistance Patrol (IMAP) program and the Division of Aviation’s Unmanned Aircraft System (UAS) program recently helped develop and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[53,127],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-21137","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-north-carolina","category-unmanned-systems"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21137","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=21137"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21137\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":21138,"href":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21137\/revisions\/21138"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21137"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=21137"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateaviationjournal.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=21137"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}