Rogue drone over house fire troubling for Foothills firefighters

Foothills firefighters faced a different sort of problem at a DeWinton-area fire earlier this month. 

Crews were dispatched to an acreage near Highway 552 southwest of DeWinton in the late afternoon on Oct. 16 for reports of smoke coming from a basement. 

The Foothills Fire Department was on scene shortly thereafter and according to Deputy Fire Chief Scott Young, his team was able to locate and extinguish the fire.

“It (was) smoking good,” Young. “The crews got a really quick knockdown (extinguishing) and saved the home. It’s a big save.” 

While the smoke was coming from below, his firefighters had to worry about another hazard in the sky. Shortly after arriving on scene, Young raised alarm over an unknown drone over the scene.

In an interview following the incident, Foothills Fire Chief Rick Saulnier stated the drone creates a number of problems at the scene, as a general distraction to responders and significant risk. 

"It was taking a lot of the attention – it's kind of distracting with a lot of the guys on scene,” Saulnier said. “We set up perimeters, better known as hazard control zones, on the fire ground for a few specific priorities. 

“We don’t mind that people are taking pictures from outside that perimeter, just as long as we don’t have to worry that drone comes down because of heat or malfunction.”

Saulnier pointed to the Canadian Aviation Regulations (CAR), which govern all aircraft operation, including drones, which prohibit a remotely piloted aircraft over or within a security perimeter established by a public authority in response to an emergency.

While

In an email statement, drone expert Chris Healy said beyond the regulations, it’s simply a bad idea to fly a drone over a fire scene.

The founder and CEO of Okotoks-based In-Flight Data, Healy has been a pioneer in the drone industry, holding three Guinness World Records for Beyond Visual Line of Sight flight operations.

“They don’t want you there. You are a liability to the emergency crews and they don’t need or want to have to rescue one of their first responders because of a drone,” he said, adding that various conditions present at an emergency scene could increase chances of a lost control link or fly-away scenario. 

“There are lots of radio frequencies being used at emergency scenes, including the same frequencies and channels as your off-the-shelf drone. This could mean your aircraft may lose control, at which point a whole new set of CAR infractions would apply.” 

Beyond that, fire presents its own specific set of dangers when a drone flies into the picture. 

“If a fire has any type of aerial activity (e.g., other fire department drones, truck ladders, aerial water attack, etc.) this could mean the temporary shutdown of these emergency services until the rogue drone issue is resolved, adding precious minutes to the response,” Healy stated in his email. “This time loss can mean all the difference to emergency services.”  

Flying over a burning home means environmental factors could have adverse and unpredictable effects on the drone’s ability to stay in the sky. 

“Very hot air has a tendency to warp and melt plastic, and most lift propulsion is done with plastic rotor blades,” Healy said. “Flying your aircraft over a fire scene could result in both an uncontrollable aircraft, which could be followed by a catastrophic failure of the aircraft caused by the melting of the control surfaces.” 

Typically powered by lithium polymer batteries, consumer drones can potentially combust or explode if the airframe goes down over a fire. 

“Physics would take over at that point, and the aircraft would experience an uncontrolled crash directly below, and into the fire department emergency scene,” he said. “The lithium batteries on-board the aircraft would now be exposed to the fire and could explode and cause additional harm in very bad ways.” 

Ultimately he urged consideration and empathy. 

“If it was your house on fire, your family at risk, would you want fire rescue to stop because a drone was threatening the emergency scene?” Healy said. “It’s the same for why we pull over on the road for an ambulance: if it was your family, you would want others to do the same as well.”