The Growing Impact of UAS in State Government

Beyond the Buzz (episode 10) - The Growing Impact of UAS in State Government  

April 8, 2025 

Kyle Jeffferson 0:01  

Good morning. Thank you for joining Northern Plains UAS Test Site for the April edition of Beyond the Buzz. My name is Kyle Jefferson. I am the partner engagement manager at Northern Plains UAS Test Site. Today we'll be talking with Clint Fleenstein from the North Dakota Department of Emergency Services and Russ Bookholtz from the North Dakota Department of Transportation to get a better understanding of how UAS is assisting different state agencies. Gentlemen, thank you for taking the time to meet with me this morning. Clint, if you'd like to start and just give us a brief introduction of yourself and a little overview of how your agency is currently using UAS in your operations. 

Clint Fleckenstein 0:37  

Certainly. Well, I'm Clint Fleckenstein. I'm the autonomous systems and communications specialist for the North Dakota Department of Emergency Services. So, half of my position is working with UAS, and half is working with strategic communications. I'm a video guy by trade. I worked in broadcasting for many years and I did a lot of live streaming and other video production for the state since I joined and so I bring a lot of the video perspective to our utilization of UAS. My position is new as of December 22nd. The big thing to know about the Department of Emergency Services is that we are a coordinating agency. It's actually phrased that way I believe in the Century Code. We're relationship builders. When you think about all the different things that happen in a disaster of any type, you know, people think about all of the boots on the ground, the ambulances, the rigs, the bulldozers clearing debris, whatever it may be. We are the hub, not necessarily the spokes. And so, the best way to put it is that we are relationship builders, so one of the things that I bring to the table is being able to, and I am a part 107 pilot. I have been for almost since the inception of that certificate, and I fly personally and do a little bit of freelance here and there with a couple of different units, but my job is I don't want to make too much of an office space reference, but I will try and talk to the pilots, so incident command doesn't have to.  I can bring the perspective of a photographer and videographer and a drone operator to when a disaster strikes basically there the first three questions from our command is can we get imagery then it is can we get aerial imagery then it is can we get live aerial imagery well I take those requests and I help parse those into something that an aerial operator could be actually it could be a civil air patrol person in the Cessna I fly for CAP as well. Or it could be a small UAS operator in a county sheriff's office or rural fire department. I know what incident command is looking for, and I know what it's like to be that guy with the drone out in the field, and I'm able to translate that and help them get their imagery back to us in a timely fashion. So, not only do they have clear instructions in the field, but unified command and our stakeholders at the top, our decision makers, they get what they're looking for. 

Kyle Jefferson 3:02  

All right, thank you for that, Russ, could you also please give a brief introduction of yourself, and an overview of how your agency is currently using UAS?  

Russsell Buchholz 3:12 

 Sure, my current position, I'm the innovation manager for the strategy and innovation division.  and we started that in 2019. We started with the drone side.  There was state law that we could not basically purchase aircraft, and that was held by legislation, and we did seek I'll say a legal opinion on it, and it also meant drones. So, we didn't get drones till 2018 until the basically a law was cleared to allow us by drones.  but we did start beforehand on the integrated pilot program or integration pilot program with the test site.  We were one of 10 entities. There were three dots, US, Kansas, and North Carolina, within this test program. We were pushing the boundaries of drones at that time flying over people and some of those things using a parachute where we're you trying to integration safety operations in those type of environments, so that kicked off the IPP and with that is it's gone for the beyond program and now we're moving into the beyond phase two where we're going to be using larger aircraft flying beyond visual line of sight with and flying higher. So, it's not part of 107 will be part 108 which is a new type of license.  I've been a part 107 carriers license since about 2018 and with the DOT, my background is IT and military. So that's where I came from. And with that, we have roughly 55 pilots, and we have 34 aircraft within our department. So, we use we have a fixed wing aircraft with a Leica system for lidar, light detection, and ranging, and then we also have a drone that has lidar as well. So, we can move that to smaller locations where it doesn't require, you know, the pilots and everything else on our fixed wing aircraft to go out there and do some of that for our 3D. Everything in our construction environment is always in 3D. Now, we have use cases as far as within our construction area, our structure area. And what I mean by that is, you know, supplementing our bridge inspections and some of those things so we can detect with our thermal, delamination's or anything else as far as cracking or anything else going there or just monitoring a lot of things. And then we also use it for emergency responses and some of those. And we just acquired two photo kites which are tethered drones. So, and they also have thermal, so they are they're on a string and they can run 24/7 so long as it's not too windy and the environment's correct, but that will help like an emergency response for hot spots, watching ice jams, you know, along bridges or even, dyke monitoring or something like that. So, we've been getting more into more drones, I'll say every year, and we find more use cases. So, we are actually even doing pay quantities to our contractors. We're using drones.  Instead of doing a survey work where it would take a surveyor 8 hours, we can do it in 15 minutes with a drone. So it is definitely helping us out in that realm, and also as far as getting the information out to our public, we use a lot of those channels, you know, your YouTube channels, Facebook on those things and with our communication division, they heavily used drones to just get that information out as far as our projects and what to expect in some of those areas to basically let them know as far as if there's any , traffic involvement of slowness, you know, where we have construction zones and some of those things. So, we've been heavily using drones, you know, and I don't see it going away.  

Kyle Jefferson 7:00 

 All right. Yeah. Then that'll perfectly lead into, you know, the next thing that I want to talk about.  You know, you mentioned the, you know, how it's eliminating having one person go out there for eight hours.  What are some of the other things that you're seeing in your agency of how the integration of UAS has changed how your team performs its work both in terms of efficiency and safety?  

Russell Bucholz 7:23  

 you know within our you know we can do linear area and vole measurements and we use Pix 4D as a software again all our inspections but we can do a lot of the surveying work with our stock piles pits concrete repair areas where we can use those and get a good assessment and then like I mentioned on the bridges with the lamination we can instead of or we can supplement the chain dragging but we can also use that to get the heat signature off the decking of the bridge to show if there's any delamination on those bridges. again, it eliminates us closing a highway down where we can do this while traffic's still flowing.  So, it's safety for our employees, safety for the traveling public, and plus we get better data from that.  

Kyle Jefferson 8:13 

 So, and then yeah, Clint, I'm sure in emergency services you're seeing a huge difference between, you know, having people go perform the task versus using UAS, could you kind of discuss that a little bit?  

Clint Fleckenstein 8:27  

Sure. There's a I mentioned at the outset that, you know, it's become just standard that our command staff are accustomed to being able to see now what's going on the ground wherever a disaster is taking place. And as the technology has increased, they're growing accustomed to, like I said, first they want imagery, then they want aerial imagery, now they want to live aerial imagery. And as technology and things improve, we're able to get that for them. Another thing is and this is huge for us as a coordinating agency is because the availability of UAS across the state, North Dakota being the UAS friendly environment that it is, we can rely on resources out in the field that I don't have to find somebody here that I can send out somewhere. We've had an instance where there was a small dam that was threatening a small town. Their county sheriff was able to put their aircraft in the air and send us imagery at regular intervals and was able to provide us with the situational awareness that our decision makers need. And so that's really the big thing for us is just the ability to make more informed decisions and to get more contextualized just a good feel for what's going on the ground.  

Kyle Jefferson 9:46  

And then I know this past fall here we had some wildfires out in western North Dakota.  Were drones pretty impactful and the response to those?  

Clint Fleckenstein 9:56 

 In a way, one of the things that made the historic wildfires of October 24 so historic were the 70 mph winds. And when that happens, you know, you really can't put anything in the air. Our civil air patrol planes can't fly. We can't get helicopters spun up and small UAS, you know, same sort of thing. , but I do know that the US Forest Service is pioneering a little bit of a drone program where they're able to actually go and start prescribed fires. They're able to go into an area that isn't very accessible, and they drop little globes that ignite, and they can do prescribed burns and set up fire brakes and that sort of thing. So, that's pretty exciting. And the unique perspective of the Department of Emergency Services is the hub, the coordinators; we're in the middle of all of that. So, we get to see a lot of these exciting things come together and add them to our toolkit. And so, we know how to reach out to these folks and say, "We have this need here, and we've got, you know, all the agreements and the relationships and things in place that we're not strangers when we pick up the phone." And overall, it provides a better response for the citizens. That's what they expect from us. And now with ever-increasing tools, versatility, versatility and just the ubiquitous nature of small UAS, now we can provide that.  

Kyle Jefferson 11:15  

Awesome. And do you have any other, you know, maybe success stories that haven't been major news, or maybe a lot of people might not be familiar with how your agency used drones to really impact something for their lives?  

Clint Fleckenstein 11:31 

I can just think of, for instance, I think Boom Lake was the dam where we really didn't know what was going on. It's a small town. It's a remote area. We were already dealing with this sort of circumstance in other parts along the state along the Missouri River system. There were a lot of tributaries and things that were looking at experiencing flooding. And to avoid having to divert resources, we're able to contact a local UAS operator and say, "Hey, can you give us a look at this?" And it helps us prioritize; you know what we want to do. It's interesting because, and this goes back to, you know, a previous question where you asked how this changes the way we do business. It's standard now within the incident command system for the Department of Emergency Services. We have the state, the emergency operations center downstairs where all the people, all the smart people, make all the smart assessments and smart decisions, and get things moving. It is standard now for us to stand up an air operations branch. That never used to be. But even if we don't have air assets working on something immediately, airspace is a question especially with wildfires because one of the first things we're asked is can we get water buckets in this area? Now, if that's an appropriate way to fight this fire, if the conditions are right for aviation, and if we have the assets moving in, now we have to watch the airspace to make sure that we aren't conflicting, unmanned aerial assets with manned because as soon as, soon as a drone enters the area, we can't put a Blackhawk in there. And so, it's given us an opportunity to do a lot of public outreaches. So, when we set up a TFR, a temporary flight restriction in an area now we have standard information and templated information that we put out to the public through social media and whatever other channels saying, you know, it's really tempting for you to go ahead and put your drone in the air and see what we're doing. But you can't do that. It's not safe. We have other assets in the area. And in some of these fires, we had federal assets; we had state assets; we had National Guard assets, all looking to utilize the same airspace. So now it's just standard for us to put somebody in that air operations chair. And we've got some really talented folks here. We've got one who was a UND flight instructor for many years. We have one who's a retired Blackhawk pilot. So, we have fixed wing, UAS, and rotor wing experience in that desk. And so, like for instance how many responding agencies understand that if the Department of Emergency Services sets up a TFR in this area, you just like anyone else can't fly your UAS in there just because we close the airspace. You know, now we're helping educate other agencies when does a special government interest an SGI waiver come into play? How do all of these pieces work together in a response scenario? So, it's a really exciting time.  You know, as the people that are in the middle of this to work with you know Russ's shop and law enforcement, fire, you know, locals, state agencies, it's pretty exciting time to get to work together with everybody with this technology.  

Kyle Jefferson 14:39 

 Yeah. And then Russ, are there any other, you know, maybe specific success stories that you've had with UAS that you maybe the public wouldn't immediately know that you used UAS to do that operation?  

Russell Buchholz 14:54 

 one comes to mind and that was in 2019, when the Red River was kind of flooding. And for those that don't know about the Red River, it flows along our Minnesota/North Dakota border, and the Red River flows north into Lake Winnipeg into the Hudson Bay.  So, we get a lot of overland flooding.  and with that, Grand Forks was always inundated with a lot of phone calls and then we also got a lot of we call them looky-loos, those people that basically just want to see what's going on because they really don't see it firsthand. and we were able to basically present what the flooding was along I-29 and the city of Grand Forks received only two calls in that time frame where we were receiving over a million views on our images that we're pushing out on our Facebook page. So, it really kept them up to date as far as what was going on, and it eliminated a lot of those people basically going into those closed areas where they shouldn't have been just for safety reasons and those things. And then also allowed us to use the drones to inspect certain bridges. So, we could open up those bridges earlier just so we could basically put a drone on it and get some eyes on there. And like Clint says, you basically can get better data back, and then you can make those you know better formed in decisions as far as what you know when we need to open these bridges back up or if anything happened to those bridges. So that's probably the last main use case that we really noticed quite a bit. 

Kyle Jefferson 16:21 

 Yeah. Yeah. And then it's important that you don't have to put any of your employees at risk to go to survey those bridges, yeah, that's great.  

Kyle Jefferson 16:33, 

so I guess, you know, kind of along the same lines, but you know, obviously the big news story right now is, you know, how the National Defense Authorization Act of 2025 is going to impact, you know, what drones can be used and can't be used, start with you, Russ.  What impacts do you see or foresee that possibly having on your agency?  

Russell Buchholz 16:52 

 Okay. We've known this for quite a while, or we've been preparing for this for quite a while. So, our larger aircraft was Watts Innovation. It's a Prism. So that's US made. And then we purchased some Skyio X10s for our bridge inspection personnel. So, our I'll say our critical infrastructure such as our bridges are not being inspected by those types of drones that our adversary has that we're worried about data information going to them. but we still have quite a few that are out there and right now is we're starting in December of 2025 we will not be able to use them for any federal projects. So, we'll have to look at some other means as far as and right now I think the US drone industry is catching up, but they are behind as far as quality and cost and some of those things.  but they are catching up. So, we'll have to look at some of those.  but we'll just use some of that we purchased you know if we need to use a drone on those things. But we also like I said we have a Lidar unit in our fixed wing that we can use. So, it's not going to stop us as far as getting that information, but it might slow us down a little bit.  

Kyle Jefferson 18:03 

 And then, correct me if I'm wrong, but if you do use any of those drones for any federal project, you risk losing the funding involved.  

Russell Buchholz 18:11 

 That is correct. You jeopardize federal funding 100%. So, that's definitely where we will not use them on any type of federal job site.  

Kyle Jefferson 18:23  

All right. Yeah. Clint, how do you foresee any issues with your agency, with the National Defense Authorization Act of 2025?  

Clint Fleckenstein 18:32  

Well, I would like to say that it doesn't because I'm relying on Russ and his guys to fly missions for us and absorb the cost, but that's not the case. So, you know, we're just getting off the ground, pun intended, with the UAS program. We do have ambitions to, you know, start with, you know, one asset, one platform and go from there. Well, now it went from being able to dip our toe in the water affordably to now it's a capital purchase, and there are all kinds of, you know, funding authorizations and that sort of thing. But what Russ mentioned is really big for us is because we rely on people all over the state to be called able to call up and say, "Hey, can you fly this mission for us?" Well, now we have to worry about what sort of equipment they can fly because now not only does it affect the operation of such equipment or the procurement of such equipment, but now it's the operation as well. And so, I'm not a lawyer, but when I'm thinking about if I'm asking somebody to fly a mission for me whether or not we can get FEMA reimbursement to pay that person. And I mean the simple, you know, that raises the specter if we can't use federal funds to operate this equipment. Can we use federal funds to reimburse somebody who's responding to a disaster? My gut says no. It's certainly not something I would count on. So, that that does actually make a big deal for us, not only for what we hope to purchase to get our program going, but what assets we rely on in the field during an emergency, what we can do with those and who we can ask to help us based on what platform they have.  

Russel Buchholz 20:06  

And Kyle, I failed to mention that we do have the photo kites as well. It's not those are not US made, but they are made out of Switzerland. So they are on the green list, not the blue list, but they do qualify. So, we could use those as well, but we're only, you know. Again, we're limited to 150 ft with those.  but, you know, again, those are other aircraft that we could use in those cases.  

Kyle Jefferson 20:30 

 All right. Great. Great.  So, you know, obviously the UAS is still kind of relatively new, and you know, it sounds like you guys are doing a lot of great work already, but, start with you, Clint, where do you foresee the UAS role evolving with your agency in the next 5 to 10 years?  

Clint Fleckenstein 20:51  

I think we have some pretty big ambitions, we'll have to start small, but we know that this technology gives us exactly what we need. We need a quick responsive way to get a meaningful operating picture of an area that we need to help when somebody's having maybe the worst day of their lives. And so, I think technology and interoperability, and standardization have been coming along with leaps and bounds. I think we've seen some cracks in the rigidity of the regulatory framework with things like part 108 coming out and that sort of thing. So that's going to give us more versatility, the United States manufacturers are coming along, so hopefully we'll have some comparable options and that sort of thing, I think the future is bright. We're really excited about, you know, getting some things going. We're excited about the relationships that we've built with, you know, the North Dakota Department of Transportation, other state agencies, and other locals. And so, this has been a game changer, and I think it will only get better for us. 

Kyle Jefferson 21:55  

Sounds great. And then Russ, anything to add on how you see the future for the DOT? 

Russell Buchholz 22:02 

 Yeah, I guess we've been working on what's called a smart corridor and it's basically we designated I-29 from border from the Canadian border all the way down to South Dakota border. So, we are looking at using drones and other technologies to I'll say supplement with you know AI you know artificial intelligence some of those things and where we can detect anomalies in those areas and basically be more efficient with our snowplows or you know should underpass get blown in, we'll be able to detect it right away and push our assets to those known areas. Also, in the future we're looking at the transportation corridors. So, with advanced air mobility is a huge thing.  where basically you're looking at an autonomous type aircraft that would fly from point A to point B.  we know it's probably more in the urban areas, you know, from a subway system to the top of a maybe a skyrise, but we are definitely a test site area in North Dakota where we could definitely use this to go from point A to point B and test it out. And then you'd use maybe your highline wires or something like that as your interference, but that would be your corridors, you know, as far as you know, getting to that site's location. So, it's going to happen with advanced air mobility.  How soon, I don't know, but we, you know, have been looking at it for about the last 5 years.  

Kyle Jefferson 23:24  

All right, then as we kind of look to wrap up here, is there anything else that either of you want to add that you weren't able to say previously? 

Clint Fleckenstein 23:37 

 I just think this is an excellent opportunity for us to be able to work together with our local, state, tribal stakeholders and not only is North Dakota UAS friendly state, but I think we have really good cooperation just between North Dakotans in general, public sector, private sector, within state agencies, that sort of thing. And this is another area in which that plays out. And now we've got the technology, the tools to go with talent, and we have the spirit of cooperation. And so, this helps us do our jobs much better. 

Russell Buchholz 24:08  

Yeah. And I think we have I'll say support. I know we have support, you know, on our national level as far as our senators, you know, and house of representative as well as our governor and then also, I'll say our local legislation.  They've been, you know; we've been working with them as well, and they've been allowing us to push the boundaries. So, it's nice to have that type of support where other states do not have that. 

Kyle Jefferson 24:32 

 Absolutely, so, we'll open it up. I see we have a few people joining us online.  Give you a couple minutes. If you have any questions about Flint or Russ, please go ahead and type those in the chat.  

Clint Fleckenstein 24:46  

I see we have a question in the Q&A tab about green UAS versus blue UAS. My understanding is blue UAS pertaining to DoD and those interacting with the DoD whereas green is more pertaining to public safety. But I don't know if it's necessarily mandatory. Is that the correct assessment? 

Kyle Jefferson 25:05 

 Yeah, I'd say that about ss it up  

Russell Buchhoz 25:07.  

Yeah, you're pretty spot on and there is a cost to it basically making it blue. So as far as you know, all the certifications and everything else. So, those aircraft are not cheap.  

Kyle Jefferson at 25:30 

 looks like we have another question.  if the green UAS is open to international vendors outside of the US because you had mentioned that there is that Swiss option. Yep. Yep.  

Russell Buchhoz 25:44  

Yeah. It there's certain ones that I'll say you know European air you know area as well I mean are in support of as far as what we're looking at for unmanned you know unmanned aircraft. 

Kyle Jefferson 26:03  

All right. Well, thank you gentlemen for joining us here today and for the great conversation about the uses of drones in our state. I really appreciate you taking the time to offer your insight for our audience. I also want to thank everybody that joined online, and we would love to have both Clint and Russ back in the future as the legislature continues to discuss bills that will impact the role of UAS in our state and, you know, maybe have a further discussion about what any decisions that they make and how that's going to impact your agencies moving forward, and then also just, you know, for our audience, please join us on May 13th for our next edition of Beyond the Buzz