Drones, or UAVs, are incredibly useful in the public safety sector. Most of you are aware of a drone’s role in things like surveillance or monitoring, but the application of drones in emergency response scenarios can’t be forgotten.

In today’s post, our focus is solely on drones and disaster responses. Specifically, what are the benefits of UAVs in emergencies, and how are different public safety services utilizing them?

What Does “Disaster Response” Mean?

Before we talk about the uses of drones/UAVs, let’s clarify what we mean by “disaster response”. The United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction defines it as actions taken during, or immediately after a disaster, with the goal of saving lives and ensuring public safety.

Keeping that in mind, our post will look at how drones are used in those two cases — starting with their uses during disasters/emergencies.

Using Drones As First Responders During Disasters

One of the main uses for UAVs in emergencies is as a first responder in the immediate aftermath of a disaster. Something happens, and public safety agencies must take action as quickly as possible. They call upon drones to reach disaster areas much faster than humans, equipping them with various technologies/features to be first responders.

The best example of this is a drone sent by a firefighting agency with a payload that distributes water over a surging fire. It can be enough to quell the spread of the flames until the firefighters show up to put the entire fire out. There’s an interesting story about this from the UK that explains drone swarms could be used to tackle wildfires in the future by using AI to spot and extinguish fires.

Moreover, drones can go into disaster zones before sending humans, meaning they can scope out if the area is safe or not. This is possible thanks to various sensors and cameras on the drone relaying information to the pilots, picking up on things like severe structural damage — or in some cases, dangerous fume levels in the air. It saves human lives by stopping a first responder from putting themselves in serious danger, which would only hamper the overall response efforts.

Calling Upon Drones For Damage Assessment

Public safety services use drones during and after disasters to assess damage in a particular area. This can be damage caused by floods, earthquakes, hurricanes, fires, and anything else that may devastate an area or building. Drones take to the skies and provide real-time video footage for officials to analyze and locate the most damaged areas. In turn, this enables them to direct more of their resources to the most badly hit areas after a disaster.

It ensures the people in most need of help get it before anyone else. Advanced drones equipped with 3D mapping technology can also produce area scans that officials can use to predict what might happen next. For example, a scan of a building after an earthquake could determine key structural weak points that may lead to further damage in the coming minutes or hours. Thanks to the UAV, this was spotted early and can force an evacuation response to minimize the threat to human life.

Utilizing Drones For Search & Rescue Missions

When disaster strikes, lives are at stake. There will always be cases when individuals are trapped and need rescuing. This is extremely common during wildfires, floods, and earthquakes — and drones make it easier to locate and rescue stranded people.

We can see a real-life application of drones in emergency response scenarios like this from the Turkey earthquakes in 2023 . First responders used drones in a couple of ways to find people trapped under rubble, allowing rescue teams to go in and take them to safety. Firstly, infrared scanners on the drones helped to detect human bodies. Secondly, drones came with lights to illuminate dark areas during both day and night, making it easier to find any trapped individuals.

Using Drones To Deliver Essential Aid

Civilians need help after an emergency, but it’s not always easy to give them what they need. For instance, severe flooding can trap people on or in buildings for days on end before a team can come and rescue them. Earthquakes or hurricanes can cause roadblocks that shut people off from getting outside assistance. UAVs won’t replace conventional humanitarian vehicles like 4x4s and planes, according to the United Nations World Food Programme, the world’s largest humanitarian organization . But they could bolster responses, adding an extra, complementary tool for humanitarians to use. They can be pre-positioned in disaster-prone regions, they don’t require extensive infrastructure (like runways) to operate, and they can circumvent poor infrastructure.

In cases like these, drones are used to deliver essential aid through care packages. It’s something that military drones have done for years during active conflict situations, delivering aerial support over battlefields. For disaster response, drones can carry medical kits or food and water to those in need. It gives them the essentials to help them manage until they can be rescued — it’s especially useful in remote locations, like islands.

Drones Improve Public Safety Responses To Disasters

All of the things we’ve mentioned show the different benefits of UAVs in emergencies. They help improve search and rescue, deliver essential aid, become first responders, and assess damage to reduce the negative impact of a disaster. When you bring all of these elements together, you realize that drones simply improve disaster responses for public safety services.

A drone is a valuable tool in emergency scenarios because it helps the right people see the bigger picture. As well as everything we’ve already touched upon, drones allow different departments and agencies to communicate swiftly when a response is necessary. It’s easier and faster for officials to understand where their resources should go or what steps to take because the drones provide so much information.

In conclusion, there’s no denying that drones and UAVs are essential for disaster response scenarios in the modern age — but this is just the beginning. We expect to see even more applications for drones in emergency responses in the future, particularly as drones become more advanced and are equipped with additional technologies.

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Originally published at https://epropelled.com on May 22, 2025.