![Skyfire Consulting Drones at Tier 1 Event, drones for security, security drones](https://dronelife.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/SuperBowl1-300x300.png)
image courtesy Skyfire Consulting
Behind the Scenes: the Drones Providing Security at Tier 1 Events Just like the Super Bowl
“Ten-thousand dollar tickets for the large game? Man, that’s low-cost for a Taylor Swift concert!”
We’ve all seen the meme, and surely, apart from the commercials, the most important chatter about this weekends’ gridiron matchup can be whether TSwift could make it to Vegas from Tokyo in time for kickoff.
To ensure, every time she gets there, we’ll be seeing loads of her! What you likely won’t be seeing are the drones that various law enforcement agencies could also be using to assist protect the large event — and people it’ll be using to assist protect the large event against other drones.
Just 5 years ago (it appears like a decade in COVID-years), Skyfire had the pleasure of operating security drones for the primary time ever over a Tier 1 event.
The method for getting them approved was like determining a foreign language – I’m guessing each for us and for the federal regulators we were coping with.
It was a brand recent process, and all of us stumbled through it together. We were joined on a rooftop by our friends from CNN Air, CNN’s aerial imaging group; and though we were never close enough to see them, we heard the NFL or their television partners had one or two for cool video cutaways of Mercedes-Benz Stadium.
![SuperBowl Skyfire Security Drones](https://dronelife.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/Superbowl2-300x300.png)
Our job that day — use drones to watch the grounds surrounding the stadium, most of which belonged to the Georgia World Congress Center Authority — and report anything out of the unusual.
While it began as a vague “overwatch” mission, it quickly became apparent how these eyes within the sky were going to be useful.
Our most requested task: guiding EMS into an area where someone had been reported injured. With tons of of 1000’s of individuals on site for concert events, parties, tailgates and a few football game; finding access routes through the crowds may very well be difficult if not unattainable, and having that overhead view was key.
The following most typical call was for suspicious behavior reported in some far-flung area – an obvious cause for concern; followed by observing traffic flow out and in of the realm and the occasional call to maintain “eyes on” a motorcade of VIPs.
The one which got our juices flowing probably the most though, were reports of errant drones flying in the realm.
Our federal law enforcement partners had, for the primary time, gotten regulatory authority to make use of drone detection and mitigation technologies at this event, so everybody was on high alert!
With a 30-mile wide temporary flight restriction in place, and all of us who were purported to be there attached to tethers, anything out “free-flying” stuck out like a sore thumb.
Despite quite a few warnings, press conferences, email blasts to pilots and more; there have been, by most estimates, 57 incursions that weekend into the TFR by drones. 56 of them were picked up by the drone detection systems in place, and number 57 would have been too, to ensure.
But one among our drone teams happened to see the operator of number 57 taking his DJI Encourage out of the case on top of a parking deck, and reported it up the chain before he even turned on the drone.
Whether various agencies are using drones at this upcoming matchup, how they’re using them or who’s on the controls, we will’t say – and that’s by design. But from my vantage point 15 stories up on a roof, overlooking Atlanta’s dance with the large game, I can say surely that this technology is incredibly useful, and must be a component of the consideration for any event, big or small.
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