SUCCESSFULLY MANAGING DRONE OPERATIONS REMOTELY

FELLOWS HAVE GIVEN EXCEPTIONAL CONTRIBUTION TO THE PROJECT MANAGEMENT PROFESSION. HEAR FROM ONE HERE EACH QUARTER.

February 2021 was a time of sporadic border closures between states, due to the ongoing coronavirus pandemic. Gerard Coutts & Associates (GCA), a Victorian-based project management firm, collaborated with Aivia Group (Aivia), a NSWbased commercial drone services and solutions provider, to overcome significant challenges in deploying drone technology across borders during this uncertain time.

In this article, Gerard Coutts a Certified Practicing Project Director and a Fellow of AIPM, discusses the challenges encountered in delivering this key component of an ongoing land development project in regional Victoria.

THE IMPORTANCE OF DRONE TECHNOLOGY

Drone technology has played a key role in this development project, located in the heart of Horsham, Victoria, especially during the design stage.

By partnering with Aivia, we’ve been able to expand our product offering to clients to include Digital Surface Modeling (DSM), in addition to high-resolution aerial photography. A DSM is essentially a dimensionally scaled, geo-tagged digital version of an area of land. We overlay Building Information Models, 3D designs and infographics over DSM’s and aerial photography, for intuitive design visualisation. This has enabled us to showcase comprehensive urban design and development opportunities to stakeholders.

OVERCOMING OBSTACLES

The first challenge we faced was unpredictable border closures. Aivia can service interstate projects onsite, however between April and December 2020 unpredictable border closures prevented securing a date to fly the drone.

Aivia offers a unique and specialised service; they were able to provide us with a customised solution that our project required. There was some initial hesitancy to engage a provider across state lines, but we were reassured that Aivia were determined to achieve this component of the project and achieve it well,” says Priscilla Riscica, planning animator at GCA.

The second challenge was navigating around the pre-existing crop that was grown on the site. Until the development advances to the earthworks stage, the landowner utilises the site for agricultural produce (barley). By the time the aerial survey was scheduled to take place in October 2020, the barley crop had matured to the point where it could have significantly impacted on the quality of photogrammetric processing. Prioritising the best value for the client, a decision was made to wait until the barley crop had been harvested to conduct the onsite capture to ensure quality requirements were reliably met. Right as the location was suitable for mapping, another border closure started.

Digital Surface Model of the site at Horsham, Victoria showing aerial camera positions, heat map and contours. (Source: Gerard Coutts & Associates)

“Our solution was to manage drone operations remotely; Aivia connected with UAV pilots based in Victoria, with the competency to execute specific workflows on the ground to the standard that was required (UAVISUALS). Swift coordination between Aivia Group and the UAVISUALS team enabled the project to proceed without further delay,” says Patrick Munsey a Partner at Aivia Group.

Aivia shipped specialised hardware to UAVISUALS pilots, who acted as Aivia’s feet on the ground. Large amounts of raw data were transferred to Aivia for processing, and the resulting DSM and other data were made available online, for GCA and stakeholders to access anytime, anywhere.

LESSONS LEARNT

The key ‘learning’ is around project risk and managing complexity. The team have been agile, flexible, and adaptive to ensure project deliverables. The use of technology has ensured we have not been hamstrung by border closures and restricted travel. We recognise the complexity of COVID restrictions and of public safety and we have been able to work in parallel with these conditions without significant impact on our project program.

UAVISUALS Managing Director, Aaron Rajamoney, operating a drone on site at Horsham, regional Victoria. (Source: UAVISUALS)

Early development concept (3D design and info-graphics) overlaid on aerial photography of site. (Source: Gerard Coutts & Associates)

“This project has highlighted the importance of remote data accessibility and that the quality and capability of our data products are just as important as our ability to get it into stakeholders’ hands in a usable way. We will be focusing a lot of our resources on further developing our geospatial data management and remote collaboration capabilities for future projects,” says Patrick Munsey a Partner at Aivia Group.

Fundamentally, through the formulation of a creative and volatile plan, Aivia Group successfully managed drone operations remotely, and delivered drone data solutions to Gerard Coutts & Associates, without compromise in timeframe, budget, or the quality.

This example of interstate and interindustry collaboration demonstrates the importance of a resilient attitude and adaptable approach in the business of land use planning and, on a broader spectrum, in project management.

Author: Gerard Coutts is a Certified Practicing Project Director at Gerard Coutts & Associates, and a Fellow of AIPM. Gerard has a lifetime of practical participation in the property, building, project management, design, planning, and land management industries.