3 Reasons to Hire Licensed Pilots for Inspection Photography
With all that overhead invested in training Roy from IT, it can be tempting to try and further capitalize on his tech savvy-ness by having him fly inspections. However, drone inspection photography and documentation missions are among the hardest mission types to properly execute and require a licensed and experienced pilot to get right.
How are seemingly simple flights like roofing inspections and building inspections difficult? Glad you asked! For one, the flight conditions on these missions can go from easy to dangerous in a matter of seconds. Secondly, knowledge about what to look for and what to focus on is a skill that is very hard to acquire flying only a handful of inspection missions every year. Lastly, we are going to discuss the sheer amount of data. Thousands and thousands of photos… all of them needing to be sorted by address, building, and at times, features.
1. From 60 to hit a wall in 3 seconds.
Flying drones on inspection photography assignments seems like a simple enough task. Fly up, snap a few photos, celebrate. In reality, getting definitive answers means getting in low, slow, and getting in a flow. Being able to get within feet of potential defect areas can be the difference between finding out that that “crack” in the tile is just a pine needle and hours of fighting with a client or subcontractor over a non-existent crack.
Our pilots are trained to take it easy on inspection missions. This isn’t because we enjoy wasting time. It is because we value safety and when the drone is 150 ft in the air looking at a caulk joint or a post tension patch on a high-rise, there is a very real possibility of loosing many of the aids that make drones easy to fly. Now, we could literally write a whole blog posts on the unique dangers of high-rise inspections with drones, but for now you will just have to take it from us, slow and steady wins this race without insurance claims.
Since Hurricane Irma in 2017, our pilots have flown well over 500 inspection photography missions with scopes of work ranging from flying inside a church cathedral dome to inspecting the outside of a 24 story high-rise. Needless to say, our drone pilots have experience. This experience is incredibly important when it comes to identifying areas that might be an issue, listening to clients to understand what problems they are looking for and where they suspect they might be, and creating a plan to efficiently document the problems and suspect areas.
2. Knowledge of what to focus on.
The knowledge of what areas to inspect thoroughly and experience working with construction managers and executives ensures you always have a professional, courteous, and successful experience with our crews. Our experience in the construction industry can perfectly supplement your foreman, superintendent, or team leader, allowing them to get vital feedback to dig deeper into possible root causes and ultimately walk away with information as good, or even better than, sending a person up on a roof into harms way.
3. Data. Loads of Data.
Here’s a fact: Our company collected over 56,000 pieces of media in the last year alone. Fifty-six THOUSAND. Needless to say, we have some tricks up our sleeves when it comes to dealing with boatloads of data.
For inspections, our data is sorted in one of two ways. We either sort photos and video into folders labeled with the address of each location or we deliver it in our proprietary inspection software that overlays the drone onto Google Maps, giving our clients the number one solution for sifting through data. We have saved companies weeks in post processing time, hours looking for photographs, and all of the stress of trying to figure out what goes where.
When you need your inspection with all of the data attached, we are the clear choice. Book your inspection today.
