“We are the personal shoppers for data,” explains
Dave Malloy
, IT’s Drone Program manager. “Units tell us what aerial data they need and we go out and get it.”
In mid-March,
Dave
received a request from
Randy Smith
at Iron Mountain Pump Plant for aerial footage of erosion damage to structures known as v-dikes that protect the Colorado River Aqueduct from debris flow. In this case, there were many damaged areas along a 14-mile stretch of the CRA east of Iron Mountain.
The v-dikes, clearly visible from the air, divert debris and storm run-off away from the open aqueduct to
siphons,
locations where the aqueduct flows underground.
“Using one of our mid-sized video drones, and with the help of
John Helton
and
Marlin “Moe” Kinser
from Iron Mountain, we were able to fly 19 miles of v-dikes with the drone and capture all the video footage in less than a day,”
Dave
said.
After editing,
Dave
provided
Randy
with documentation for each of the 15 protective v-dikes and 15 siphons. On the horizon,
Dave
said, is the possibility of using software to embed geographical location data and camera projection information into the video stream so clients can not only see the damage and exact location information.
And just a few weeks ago,
Dave
met with
Travis Mensen
, a member of Met’s Field Survey team to conduct a façade survey of the Gene Wash Dam to map cracks, something that hasn’t been done for decades. Six flights of their survey drone captured 1,380 high resolution images that will be used to create a 3D model of the dam.