AP Police to acquire 10 UAVs for aerial surveilllance

Andhra Pradesh has decided to acquire 10 Unmanned Aerial Vehicles or Drones to be deployed for a variety of police and civilian applications. These drones will be used especially for controlling crime, crowd and continuous monitoring of dharnas, riots, strikes, rasta rokos, religious processions, traffic control, disaster management, tracking the movements of smugglers and a host of other things.

Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu after having seen a demo on various types of drones arranged by the State Police Chief JV Ramudu, has taken the decision to this effect. It is learnt that the government is keen to use the services of drones during Krishna Pushkaralu. The drones are capable of carrying the latest cameras with an endurance of remaining in the air up to one hour flying at an altitude of 100 m and above covering a radius up to 5 km.

The drone cameras will be used across the state for obtaining panoramic views of



crowds gathered at key areas and to keep watch on impending natural calamities such as floods, cyclones and other natural disasters besides also using them for agriculture crop management, water management, making use of image enhancement technology for image processing of vast tracks of land to distinguish the healthy and defective crops for timely harvesting purpose.

The police applications include use of advanced software for facial recognition and identification of known offenders from out of the video footage available from the public places obtained through CCTV cameras and drone cameras fitted with high-resolution infrared cameras, thermal cameras capable of distinguishing the faces out of the database of such known offenders.

It is also proposed to make use of this technology for the location of lost or abandoned vehicles, goods, missing persons and other unattended materials coming under its purview.