By L. Lamor Williams
Arkansas Democrat-Gazette
LITTLE ROCK, Ark. — Helicopter 187 weighs only 25 pounds, a far cry from full-size commercial copters, but unlike those monsters, 187 requires at least four people to operate it.
The remote-controlled helicopter fitted with a camera is North Little Rock Police Department’s newest crime-fighting tool.
The helicopter could be used to monitor crowds at big events; for surveillance of drug activity; for search-and-rescue missions or hostage crises, said Capt. Leonard Montgomery, who leads the seven-man team responsible for the chopper.
However, it won’t patrol the city anytime soon.
Currently, the department has approval from the Federal Aviation Administration to run only test flights in remote areas.
On Thursday, in a grassy field at the Remington ammunition plant in Lonoke, officers demonstrated for news reporters what the copter can do.
Since it was a bit windy, officers launched the helicopter using a hand-held controller. Once it was hovering about 400 feet off the ground, two officers in a police van used laptop computers and fancy video-game controllers to manipulate the chopper and its camera.
Montgomery explained that when controlled via computer, the helicopter is capable of automatically correcting itself. Because of the breeze, the autocorrection function might have made the chopper tilt one way or the other. A manual takeoff allows the pilot to keep the chopper level and avoid it tilting itself and possibly breaking its expensive carbon fiber blades - which are imported from Italy - on the ground.
The National Weather Service reported winds of about 6 mph Thursday for the area. Montgomery said they don’t want to risk flying the $78,000 machine in winds above 13 mph.
“It has a top speed of 35 miles per hour so it could fly in winds of up to that much, but we don’t plan to test that,” Montgomery said. “Of course with winds of 36 miles per hour, the helicopter would end up flying backward at negative 1 mile per hour.” After they had the chopper in the air for a few minutes and were getting clear pictures of passing cars and those in the parking area, the officers inside the van switched on the camera’s infrared function.
The officers zoomed in on the two dozen or so vehicles in the parking area and joked about the hot engines and brakes on the cars of reporters who might have been rushing to get to the 10:30 a.m. demonstration. The engines and brakes glowed brightly on the computer screen when the heat-detecting infrared technology was used.
Montgomery said he plans to apply by the end of the year for FAA approval to fly the helicopter in the city. The department was granted permission for test flights in May.
Reactions varied to the news that the city may someday be patrolled by a remote-controlled helicopter.
At Lakehill Barber Shop less than a mile east of the North Little Rock Police Department headquarters on JFK Boulevard, shop owner Keith Thomas said that while he might be biased because he cuts a lot of the officers’ hair, he believes their intent is noble.
“If they’re going to do it, they’re going to do it for a reason,” Thomas said. “They have a hard enough time as it is. This will make their job easier.” His client, sitting in the chair at the time, agreed.
“I’m sure they’ll use it for the purpose it’s intended for,” the man said. He didn’t want his name used because he works for a federal agency. “Anything that can help them take care of their business is good with me.” A few blocks from the police station in the other direction, at the King of Fades Barber Shop, there was more cynicism from barbers and patrons.
“I don’t think they’ll catch more crime than they’re already catching,” said barber Cash Harper. “My one concern is, they say what they’re going to do with it before they get it, but who will be responsible for them using it the way they say they’ll use it.” North Little Rock has 24 fixed cameras around the city, but Montgomery said it takes about two days to move one. “The helicopter can be in the air in 15 minutes,” he said.
He said the helicopter won’t compromise North Little Rock residents’ privacy. He said the helicopter wouldn’t see anything that a traditional helicopter or plane flying over wouldn’t see.
“You’d have to get pretty low to peek in windows,” Montgomery said. “And flying in backyards around trees, we just couldn’t do that without the risk of crashing.” Flying the copter requires a pilot at the laptop, a safety pilot with a hand-held controller, a camera operator and at least one spotter to alert the pilots of any obstacles, Montgomery said. Only a handful of highranking police and fire officials along with dispatchers would have access to the footage recorded by the camera when it’s used, he said.
To fly the machine, the men had to complete an FAA course in Virginia as well as training sessions with the manufacturer, Rotomotion LLC in South Carolina. Montgomery said they’ve logged 30 hours of practice flights since October.
North Little Rock Police Chief Danny Bradley, who also watched the test flight from the sidelines, said after a successful landing that he knows from experience that flying the machine wasn’t as easy as it looked.
“They’ve got a simulator they practice on,” he said. “I tried and crashed every time.”
Copyright 2009 Arkansas Democrat-Gazette