Bee Cave Police Department receives waiver to use autonomous drones

Bee Cave police use drones to serve community

The Bee Cave Police Department is utilizing drones like no other department in Central Texas. They say they're the first to use autonomous drones.

BEE CAVE, Texas - The Bee Cave Police Department is utilizing drones like no other department in Central Texas.

They said they were the first to receive a waiver to allow pilots to operate remotely.

Bee Cave PD drones

What they're saying:

The Bee Cave police dispatch looks different.

"A new innovative way to leverage technology to help us serve the community better and also to serve as a force multiplier," Bee Cave Police Department Chief Brian Jones said.

Soaring through the air, the drone can get to a scene much faster than a patrol car can on the roads.

"If there's some type of delay in our response for, say, traffic or things like that, the drone bypasses all of that," Chief Jones said.

With views from the sky, it can also help officers gather crucial information before they arrive.

The Bee Cave Police Department has already utilized drones for almost a year, during fire assessments, search and rescue operations, large events like the Pecan Street Festival, and weather emergencies.

"It was giving us constant live updates as to the road conditions, so we could deploy our officers to collisions and our public works. We could divert resources from public works to help sand roadways. We could monitor the roads, how traffic was and things like that without actually deploying officers," Chief Jones said.

Dig deeper:

The department is now elevating its use of drone technology. They were just approved for the ‘Beyond Visual Line of Sight’ waiver.

"Those pilots no longer have to have an observer watching the drone as it flies to the location of where the call is, and also we don't have to have a pilot physically flying the drone. They're completely autonomous. They fly themselves," Chief Jones said.

Chief Jones said this will allow them to expand their program rapidly.

"It's exciting for us because we're at the forefront of applying this technology to law enforcement and emergency response," Chief Jones said.