In Episode 11 of The Unmanned Podcast, host Matt Hernandez leads a roundtable discussion from Commercial UAV Expo with industry leaders Calvin Reeb (Cargill), Isaac Bechet (Quanta Aviation Services), Kyle Miller (Censys Technologies), and Josh Olds (USI). Together, they break down real-world drone use cases, ROI, workforce challenges, and what Part 108 gets right—and wrong—as the industry moves toward scalable, beyond visual line of sight operations.
Q1: What drone use case has had the biggest impact on your career?
Calvin: Asset inspections. Drones let us capture detailed 3D data in hours instead of days and reuse it long after the flight.
Isaac: Mapping rights-of-way for critical infrastructure—especially before construction. It reduces truck rolls, which are one of the biggest safety risks.
Kyle: Vegetation management. Drones help identify dead or unhealthy trees before they cause accidents, outages, or fatalities.
Q2: What’s the biggest misconception about drones today?
Josh: That drones are fully autonomous. There’s still a human in the loop. We’re not at “self-flying with no oversight” yet—and that’s not a bad thing.Q3: How do drones deliver real ROI?
Calvin: ROI isn’t just dollars. It’s:
- Cost savings and avoidance
- Safety improvements
- Efficiency (getting assets back online faster)
Common high-ROI use cases include asset inspections, construction monitoring, and stockpile surveys.
Q4: How do drones reduce risk for workers?
Isaac: We don’t have to climb towers, fly helicopters as often, or send people driving long distances. Drones' lower exposure to the most dangerous parts of the job.
Q5: What are the biggest challenges when implementing drones?
Josh: Finding the right talent, internal buy-in, and building aviation-grade processes in non-aviation industries. Every industry faces different headwinds.
Calvin: Defining success early. If you can’t clearly show value, programs get stuck in R&D forever.
Isaac: Expectation management. One drone can’t do everything. Each sensor and use case is its own specialty.
Q6: How will Part 108 impact your operations most?
Calvin: BVLOS will allow us to cover more ground, faster, with fewer people—especially in remote areas.
Isaac: It supports scaling, but the removal of waivers creates gaps that still need to be addressed.
Q7: What did the pending Part 108 rule get right?
Kyle: Population density rules don’t align with real-world utility operations or current BVLOS waiver experience.
Isaac: Lack of ADS-B requirements, especially for heavier aircraft and right-of-way operations where helicopters are active.
Q8: What did the pending Part 108 rule get wrong
Josh: Organizational responsibility (not just individual pilots), movement toward UTM and airspace integration, and aviation-style safety systems and documentation.
Calvin: It unlocks efficiency—using aircraft the way they were designed instead of constantly repositioning.
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