Creating an Air Space That is ASSUREd Safe
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This is CNA Talks, the flagship podcast of CNA, a Washington, D.C.-based research and analysis organization. First responders increasingly use drones across the United States, where dozens of public safety agencies now utilize this technology. While the potential utility of these systems is vast, they are only as good as the people operating them. In this episode, we discuss the utility and controversy of drones as tools for public safety.

and what their operators need to know to use them effectively. Welcome to CNA Talks. I'm John Stimson. Today, we're going to be talking about the latest news in uncrewed aerial systems, or UAS. And I'm excited to welcome BJ McClinton and Michelle Hannon from one of CNA's partners, Assured Safe, to the podcast today. BJ and Michelle, it's great to have you both on. Thanks so much for having us. Thanks, John. It's nice to be on with you. We also have Stephen Havik, who is the director of CNA's

Center for Enterprise Systems Modernization. Steve, great to have you back. Thanks, John. Great to be back again. So just got to start it. BJ, can you tell us a bit about Assured Safe for our listeners who might not be familiar with your organization? Yeah, John. So Assured Safe is a federated ecosystem that's been tasked by Congress to do training, education, and certification for first responders.

across all public safety agencies for law enforcement, fire, and even emergency medical services. We're using UAS or unmanned aircraft systems in the national airspace for emergency response and disaster response recovery work.

So, and the stem for this program came from the ASURE program, which is the FAA Center of Excellence, which is the Alliance for System Safety of UAS of the Research Excellence. And so they do pretty much all of the UAS research and work for the FAA. And this started about two to three years ago with one of their initial projects, which was this

disaster prep and recovery. And from that phase, the need was outlined that there is gaps in the response for first responders of other public safety agencies when it comes to doing disaster recovery and relief work as integrating UAS in the national airspace.

And so identifying those needs, there was the determination that there needed to be a program to help standardize the training and the education for first responders to be able to effectively do their jobs safely and efficiently, especially when it comes to interagency collaboration, working with other groups and making sure they were the standardized data capture process and dissemination process.

I think that's really valuable, especially understanding that new technology is only as good as the people who operate it, right? And I think it's really easy to lose sight of the human element of technology integration when it comes to new tools. I think we often just end up focusing on like, oh, well, isn't this exciting? This is like so cool. Look at all these capabilities. But if you don't have people who know how to use those tools, then

then you may be waiting hours for a certified operator to come to a scene to use one. - We see the technology is probably

the most frequently changing factor. And that's one of the challenges we have today is keeping up with the advancement in UAS platforms, as well as the applied technology that goes with it, the different types of sensors and cameras, and then even the software that's being utilized for different agencies when it comes to their professional job descriptions or their use cases, whether it be fire, law enforcement, or again, like we said, EMS,

And so really a lot of it goes beyond just the operational skills that we teach as well, but just making sure

first responders understand the technology that's there, the tools that they have, the limitations of those tools and the platforms, as well as the capabilities in order to be able to do all the different things that's involved with their day-to-day operations, as well as when it comes to large-scale operations. Steve, where does CNA fit into this mission? Where do our teams overlap? Our audience will be familiar with CNA's work, longstanding work with the Navy and the type of work we do. But

Really, we've also focused on driving digital transformation in the aviation sector, working with the FAA for over 30 years now. And so when we look at this, we're bringing our deep understanding of the operations and how to integrate these technologies.

newer technologies into different operations. And it's been with work at the FAA, but also involving NASA and state and local jurisdictions, particularly with work here in the Commonwealth of Virginia. So when we're looking at this and working with the Assured Safe team, I think we found a combination of mission drive on how do we get this advanced technology into the hands of first responders, of emergency responders and public safety,

And how do we do it in a way that's efficient, effective drives towards them fully embracing these technologies?

And through our work, the expertise that the Assured Safe team brings on these operations, we combined it with some of the technical knowledge that we bring here at CNA on how to integrate the different platforms and present a solution that ultimately will allow the first responder to kind of harness this training and enhance operations.

Got it. Thanks for that. Michelle, anything you'd like to add on Assured Safe or CNA and like, or your interactions with CNA at this point? Oh, absolutely. I would just say, you know, we're so proud here at Ole Miss to be a partner with Assure. We're the only policy legal arm in the Assure program. And I think that is really indicative of how important it is to sort of

support new technologies like UAS with the proper regulations and not be overburdensome. One of the things we're really focused on is how to get the public to accept the use of drones by law enforcement and for disaster management, because there's still sort of a visceral, I think, reaction. Oh, I don't want that drone flying over my yard.

And that's what people think about. And so really when we talk about sort of policy and legal, we're really talking about awareness raising and explaining better the platform for non-engineers. Yeah, absolutely. I think that like there is...

always going to be some reaction to new technology, especially something that's like visible to people. So and something like drones can elicit certain ideas of what they look like. So education and understanding what this actually looks like is very important.

And that actually kind of leads us nicely into the next section of our discussion, because now that we understand the background on our organizations, what are some major news events that you all are following and issue areas that you're following at Assured Safe right now? Michelle, we'll start with you here.

Sure. So drones have been in the news a lot lately. Just before Christmas, we had the big New Jersey drones, right? You know, what are they? And I sort of giggle about that because, you know, you have one drone and then you have other drones going to see what that drone is doing. Then all of a sudden you have a whole swarm of drones and, oh, my God, what are they doing? So we need to address what can we do with drones? Can we shoot them down? How can we...

equip our law enforcement officers to deal with these kinds of things and to spread calm in the public. You know, we're thinking about the Commonwealth of Virginia. There's a lot of drone issues coming up around Norfolk, right? What are those drones doing that they're flying at 100 miles an hour zipping over our naval bases? And what can we do to prevent them? How we, you know, can we geofence? And the final sort of piece

of that when we think about it, I think that's one of the most important things is understanding what law enforcement and disaster managers and emergency response teams can do and what they cannot do. And we're going to start to see a lot of sort of bucking heads with the Fourth Amendment with respect to these issues. Yeah. So let's talk about that a little bit, because I think like

There are currently regulations for, you know, larger aircraft and things like that and how that relates to the Fourth Amendment. But it's not exactly clear how drones fit into the picture there. So can you talk a little bit about the legal issues around that and what challenges that presents?

Of course. So we know that we have a right to privacy. The Fourth Amendment says the police can't just come and look over into our yard. Right. And that's a really fundamental part of our freedoms in the United States, that freedom to sort of have your own space. Well, we've learned over the years that that freedom privacy right can be eroded.

And one thing that the Supreme Court has said is if it's an aircraft in the national airspace and there happens to be a policeman on that aircraft, even if the policeman is on that aircraft, just to that, I should say that law enforcement officer is on that aircraft precisely to see what's going on in somebody's backyard. That is entirely legal. That is not an invasion of privacy because you don't have an expectation of privacy from an aircraft flying 500 feet above you.

Okay, great. Well, now you have a drone and the FAA says uncrewed aircraft are aircraft. We're not going to treat them any differently from how we treat a private plane or a commercial aircraft. And so then we're looking back at the Supreme Court and saying, well, the Supreme Court says it's okay to look down, but what if it's from a drone that's only 100 feet above your yard? I

At what point do you have some privacy in your yard? At what point is it no, nothing? So the drone can be much, much more invasive, but we don't really know how to deal with it yet. Steve, let's zoom out a little bit here and talk about CNA's work with UAS systems in

Virginia, because you mentioned that a little bit before, and this is a good opportunity to bring some of that in. Where does CNA fit into some of these discussions about UAS and first responders, especially in Virginia? Sure, Don. One of the things that this brings to mind is CNA partnering with a variety of different partners throughout the Commonwealth of Virginia is

has spent a lot of time over the past couple of years, especially focusing on the use of autonomous systems and some of these uncrewed vehicles around the port of Virginia. So we had a large scale project looking at, just as Michelle mentioned before,

We're looking at some of the different operations in and around port security and emergency response, and especially around some of the unique challenges that a port environment itself can realize. And especially down in the Port of Virginia where you have a variety, not just the port itself, but you have the naval operations

the base down there, a fairly congested area of a lot of different operations coming forward in that regard. And so we were looking at when you engage all of the stakeholders in that area and look at how they might have to respond to different scenarios, say when a hurricane comes through and causes damage, or if they're looking to respond to some of these, maybe a hazmat spill or some of these other areas that it becomes complex in that environment. And

Where can UAS and other autonomous systems serve to enhance these operations? But not just the technology, right? It also has to, how do the different agencies and organizations that have to come together and respond to these, how do they all serve in that common operating picture? So we all want to send a lot of technology out.

at the problem, which certainly helps things, but to make sure that we have that common operating picture and how these different organizations work together becomes a key aspect of the research we've done. And that's where sort of understanding who's coming together to solve the problem, the approaches they're taking, making sure that we're

aware of these different operations that are occurring in the same space and how they're coming together. Those are some of the different activities that we were working on with a variety of different agencies and organizations throughout the Commonwealth to come together and put their heads together around a solution that could be fielded in the future at the port.

Michelle, I'd be kind of curious, you know, what your experience is. I know you guys kind of work more at the local level, but how, you know, is that something that you've run into about this idea of crafting these common operating ideas between different agencies?

Absolutely. And while we do work at the local level, I mean, we have to remember that the airspace is federal. And so anytime we do something with the UAS, the FAA is going to get involved or try to get involved. You know, they want to regulate down to the tip of the blade of grass in your backyard. So we have to be very mindful of

of the different constituencies and stakeholders or the locality, right? And at what point can, for example, a community say, well, we don't want any drones whatsoever. And how is that going to impact, for example, a firefighting drone if it needs to get across the community in order to get to the fire or any other sort of emergency management? We're seeing so much in terms of the growth of drones as first responders, right? And, you know, that first responder is going to want to cut across that backyard and

And so how are we going to navigate, if you will, local, state and federal airspace and to be able to support all of the good things we know we can get from drone use? You know, and just everything we've talked about here. And that's kind of where the importance of Assured Safe comes in is to be able to keep up with the current situation.

regulations and policies that are out there in dealing with like the FAA or dealing with these issues that law enforcement are facing, or even, you know, the other agencies as they try to utilize journalists as first responders are facing dealing with the public's perception. And so from our end, we try to implement training and educational models to help

local law enforcement or local fire departments on those local jurisdictions deal with these issues that they're facing. And so that's the Assured Safe model is to put out that timely, relevant information. We have our core courses that we have available, but we also want to build a model that we can keep first responders educated in all of the issues that they may face on a day-to-day basis. And

That kind of leads us into the next topic for discussion, because while we've so far talked about drones as a tool for first responders and for government agencies, these are things that are also being used by private individuals. I'm thinking specifically of the story of the drone that hit an aircraft that was involved in the firefighting efforts in L.A. Michelle, can you tell us about this story and what lessons you all are taking from it in the Assured Safe project?

John, this story is a really sort of sad one because this was a private drone operator, no malicious intent whatsoever. Just there's a lot of big fires going on in LA. Why don't I just send my drone up and get a look? Maybe he was going to, I don't even think he was looking for his own house. It was just sort of what's going on. You know, I want to know.

And he lost sight of his drone. So he did violate the federal regulations that the drone went beyond the visual line of sight. And so he couldn't see it. And it hit a firefighting aircraft and did $80,000 worth of damage. But what's worse is it sidelined that aircraft at a very important time in the effort to fight the fires. So what have we learned? Well, I mean...

I don't think it was a learning experience so much as a wake up call. We have tried very hard. The FAA has a lot of rules. Rules that are really hard to enforce. And so this is, I think, really one of the many brilliances of Assure is the more

law enforcement and emergency responders are themselves using these drones and these UAS. The more they get out into the community and are able to explain what they're doing and why it's important not to hinder what they're doing. So the other lesson that came out, of course, especially on the back of these New Jersey drones is, all right, well,

What can law enforcement do if it sees a drone that's harassing firefighters? And you know what? Not a lot. And so this is one of our big efforts for 2025 is to give more power to law enforcement personnel to actually do what we call counter UAS activities from sending up an electric signal to freeze them to shooting them down.

Yes. And I think that like that we're just entering a new regulatory environment here with these new sets of tools that like people kind of intuitively know the rules about driving your car, for example. But something like the drone operation regulations, they exist. But, you know, somebody who just is a private drone operator might not have a full picture of what they look like. And so, yeah.

Being able to counter drones and having tools to do that seems necessary, especially since like, you know, you can't necessarily know that someone is going to be informed about every regulation around the drones and following them at any given time. But Steve, I want to bring you in here because, you know, we know that like there's a lot of private industry interest in the UAS systems, right?

And I believe that CNA set up a model that can help simulate these things, especially for package delivery. And I feel like that kind of tool also might be useful for understanding how these things overlap with emergency management efforts. So I just wanted to give you a chance to talk about that here. Yeah, our teams spent a good amount of time looking at different analytics and modeling and simulation approaches. And a lot of what Michelle and BJ have touched on

When we're forward-looking to when we start to have maybe some more of the rules in place, but really we're opening operations. And I particularly think when we're looking at

that rules like, Michelle mentioned the BB loss rule, beyond visual line of sight. Once operations really start to move forward like that, what is our airspace going to look like? And really, how do you look at all of the different operations? You could consider public safety, but also commercial and other operations that are going to want to use that airspace. And how is it that...

you can prioritize or assess who gets the rights to different airspace or when are different missions need to be prioritized over others and how can you give everyone their shot at that different airspace and the different routes and corridors that you may be operating through. So CNA has developed our own in-house modeling tool called UCATS that stands for UAS Cooperative Airspace Traffic Simulation

that has really allowed us to tease out some of these different scenarios and really look at what, as you continue to add more and more actors into the airspace, what is it that you need to be considering to kind of look at these different prioritization exercises for different scenarios?

And so that's one where we feel like that as folks continue to see these increase in operations, how can you ensure that you are looking at it from that aspect where you can leverage, again, leveraging this technology to enhance all these variety of different operations?

but doing it in a way that still allows that traffic management and effective operation in the airspace. We're just about out of time, but just want to, you know, just to bring everything together here. Overall, what would you like our listeners to understand about the UAS space from our conversation today? And BJ, we can start with you.

There's a lot going on when it comes to the national airspace and drones. And, you know, from the first responder standpoint that we understand, we feel your pains, but we're trying to do all the things necessary to get the necessary training and education out there to help you navigate the airspace as best you can.

And again, with having PIs like Michelle at University of Mississippi, along with our other 32 universities that's involved in the Assure COE, we have a lot of resources to help do that. And so, you know, we're diligently working to help, you know, figure out these woes out and to also provide resources.

the best information possible. Michelle, how about you? So thanks. I would like to just reiterate again how delighted Ole Miss is to be involved in the Assure effort. And to just say, one of the things that I think is so important is really understanding what

all of the vital goodness that we can get from the UAS system. You know, everything from, don't be surprised if you get into a car accident and the first thing you see is a law enforcement drone that's sending data back to the police station so that they can start to triage what to do to, you know, organ delivery and blood deliveries, to delivery of prescription medicines. And so,

This is something we need to embrace. And what's really great about the United States of America is that everybody has a say if they want it. As these rules are implemented, as they are developed by the FAA, by other agencies in the federal government, they have to send out notices of proposed rulemakings. And everybody in the country has the opportunity to comment on them.

And so if you're concerned about the privacy in your backyard or you have some questions, stay informed and ask the FAA those questions. And the FAA is actually legally obligated to answer you. So this is a real opportunity for us to harness this incredible technological platform to benefit all of our citizens. And the more people who are involved in how we do that, the better. Thanks, Michelle. What about you, Steve?

I mean, I'd like to echo a lot of what we've said here today. BJ and Michelle, I really appreciate some of your comments there. I mean, at CNA, what we've looked at is really, we take this overarching approach of how can we work with public safety, with these different federal, state, and local partners, and integrate safety.

new and emerging technologies to enhance these operations, right? And I think what we're seeing, especially in the UAS space, is we've seen so many different potential applications, but I really still think we've still got a long way to go in potential applications that we'll continue to see, especially as

as we get some more of these rules in place and we get more of these aircraft operating to a point where they're even more ubiquitous than they are today. And I think you'll see a lot of that going forward. And I think, you know, from CNA's perspective, being able to partner...

with folks like BJ and Michelle is how we can work and then look at these different agencies and organizations and bring the right mix of technology and operations that really enhances the overall public good. - Absolutely. And it's great to know that while like this new technology is moving so quickly, there are a lot of different organizations who are making sure that it's being utilized in a way that will benefit the public good. And so I'm excited to see where things are headed.

But BJ, Steve, Michelle, thank you all so much for coming on today. I've really learned a lot. Thank you. Thanks, John. For our listeners, we'll have links to both Assured Safe's website as well as the webpage for Steve's Research Center, the Center for Enterprise Systems Modernization. So you can learn a lot more about both organizations' work on this topic from their respective websites. So check those out. And I want to thank you all so much for listening.

And we'll see you next time on CNA Talks. The views expressed are those of the commentators and do not necessarily reflect those of CNA or any of its sponsors. CNA Talks is produced, edited, and mixed by John Stimson. Our theme music is by Edward Granga. If you enjoy our show, we'd love it if you could give us a five-star review on Apple Podcasts and tell your friends about us. Thanks again for listening, and we'll see you in two weeks.