Exclusive | LAPD chief reveals plan to double drone fleet to tackle homicides, kidnappings and burglaries amid cop shortage
Facing an ongoing officer shortage, the Los Angeles Police Department plans to more efficiently deploy its officers and shorten response times by doubling the size of a cutting-edge drone fleet that the department is making permanent this week.The nations’s third largest police force increasingly deployed the unmanned aircraft since launching a “drone as a first responder” pilot program last July.Now, department leadership is doubling the size of the effort and making it official.In an exclusive interview with The California Post, LAPD Chief Jim McDonnell said the department is better able to fight crime thanks to the new, smaller craft joining the LAPD’s familiar black-and-white helicopters.“To be able to decrease our response time to emergency calls for service, and to be able to use it as a force multiplier for a very lean department, that is very important,” McDonnell said.
“The operation of the drones has been very, very impressive.” Drones have already been used by the department with strong results, McDonnell said, boosting safety at high-profile events such as the World Cup, and helping cops more quickly defuse dangerous situations and rapidly solve crimes.The fleet is growing from 13 to 26 electric drones, with the aircraft used to assist first responders and some used on occasion to enforce flight-restriction zones.LAPD drones were deployed more than 3,000 times last year, mostly in response to emergency calls or officer requests for assistance, department officials said in a report presented to the Police Commission in April.The LAPD’s drones are controlled by FAA-certified offers using desktop computers in police headquarters.They’re frequently deployed to incidents in high-crime areas.
An online dashboard shows LAPD drones flew 26 missions on Thursday alone.Powered by four sets of rotors, the department’s unmanned aircraft are about a foot wide and feature video cameras and infrared night vision.They fly from rooftop launch si...