I believe that drones are an excellent example of innovative technology that has many useful applications to support both law enforcement and the military. Coincidentally, one of my good friends that I go to church with is a SWAT Sergeant at DFW Airport, active Navy, and a drone operator, so I decided to give him a call. Some of the more practical applications that the police department utilizes drones for are...

• Overwatch: this function serves to view or blanket a designated area
• Search and Rescue
• Building and vehicle clearing: this utilization of technology serves to minimize human casualties and injuries in dangerous situations
• Crime scene documentation and 3D mapping
• Provides a birdseye view for bomb-tech robots
• Drones have thermal capabilities allowing first responders to see at night. They can also pinpoint hotspots in fires.
• There are several SWAT applications as well but those could not be shared because then he'd have to kill me (totally joking)

Some of the larger local departments are utilizing drones as a first-response tactic. Basically, drones allow law enforcement to get eyes on something without putting officers and other first responders in danger. According to my reliable source, "drones are the future of policing." The only real issue is that this technology is expensive. Not all departments are able to take advantage of this technology due to a lack of funding for both the drone program or have the qualified staff to facilitate it. Many departments have to share these drones which means that drones aren't always available, even to those departments that "own" their own.

As far as the use of drones over the United States goes, I am in favor as long as their use does not infringe on the privacy rights of our citizens. I am all for their use in assisting law enforcement and as recreational devices for private citizens. However, these drones have to be used in the right way. Drone operators have to follow certain guidelines such as not recording private citizens without their consent. Fortunately, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) maintains a database of registered drone operators along with the registration number of their drones. But not everyone registers. The only issue that I have with drone use is when it comes to corporations. This may just be my paranoia kicking in but I don't think drones should be used by corporations unless it is for marketing purposes. I am sure that there are legitimate uses for corporations like scouting potential sites for expansion, etc. but it is corporations that would most benefit from the recording or collecting of private data of the US population. Kind of like how you say out loud to someone "Man, I'd really like to go check out this or that" and five minutes later you see an ad for it on Facebook or Twitter. Those evil corporations are always listening. I can say this because this is a discussion and not a research paper. Thank goodness.

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