Commercially Available UAV for Search and Rescue operations

First let me start with I am new to this site and group. I am lucky I believe to have stumbled on this site. I am a member of a State Rescue team and I have a back ground in IT and Electronics as well as having built several model airplanes and in the process of building a full scale aircraft for personal usage. The topic came up in one our biweekly rescue meetings about having the ability to lower our SAR (Search and Rescue) costs by eliminating the use of helicopters and using a UAV. We also expanded into knowing that we wanted the ability to have thermal imaging capabilities. My question is there already a commercially available option that would allow us to set a search pattern on a computer, launch/takeoff under manual control, transmit video back to a home base, mark targets on the computer with GPS coordinates, and land/recover under manual control? I realize a predator UAV would fit the bill nicely but they are not quite ready to sell one to a state government operation just yet. I am looking for something small as possible but could still fly a 5 mile grid if possible. If not it looks like I will be exploring the possibility of building something.

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Doug Weibel September 21, 2011 at 8:50pm

Getting a FAA COA to fly the missions is a bigger hurdle than buying a system.

You should talk with Chris Miser of CLMax Engineering (google his website). He has a system for just your intended use under development, which I consult on a bit and which is quite far along. More importantly he is working with law enforcement agencies to get COA's for flying his system on SAR missions, and it appears that those agencies are having some success in getting the COAs.
Graydon Tranquilla September 1, 2011 at 7:34pm

One possible solution but far too expensive from my perspective.

http://www.draganfly.com/uav-helicopter/draganflyer-x6/
ceise May 6, 2011 at 1:07pm

The link below should be a good start based on your parameters above.

http://www.insitu.com/inceptor
Trent H May 6, 2011 at 10:24am

I am currently working for a small company providing aerial surveillance solutions. We are looking to adapt our low-cost unmanned system to an SAR application. I would like to talk further to understand how you would like to solve you current problems. Please message me for my private e-mail.
Nathan Brooks March 18, 2011 at 12:01pm

I am exploring this possibility as well. I am in Canada, so that opens some doors and closes others. We should talk as I have found some things out but don't have anything running yet. I know some Canadian Companies that have gliders that would be easily adapted and some good IR cameras. But is always a matter of money. Have you found anything out yet? I was planning on adapting mine to do wildlife counts.

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Commercially Available UAV for Search and Rescue operations

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