High-Risk Operations

Embry-Riddle bridge-inspection challenges

PATRICK SHERMAN

PILOT REPORT To any person who has ever uttered the phrase, “Those who can't do, teach,” I'd like to extend an invitation: spend a day on the flight line with Dr. Scott Burgess of the Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University Worldwide Campus Department of Flight. For myself, I've always had the utmost respect for the teaching profession, so I was delighted to be recruited for this mission—although my enthusiasm ebbed somewhat when I learned the details. I would be operating a drone a few feet from a highway bridge while another drone, piloted by Dr. Burgess, flew a few feet from mine. I've done proximity flying on several occasions in my career, and more than once I've seen it end badly: that sickening crunch when a propeller strikes an external object, followed…

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RotorDrone Pro (Digital) - 1 Issue, October - November 2020

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