What an Agency Should Provide When Requesting UAS Support

The request should identify the organization, the person authorized to request support, the incident or planning contact who can assign work, and a backup contact. For an active incident, the UAS resource also needs to know where it fits in the incident organization and who can approve, modify, pause, or terminate the assignment.

A general request from an unidentified individual is not an operational assignment. IRIS Network public pages are not an emergency-reporting channel, and sensitive incident information should move through the approved agency contact path.

Describe the question the aerial work should help answer. Examples include documenting a defined flood corridor, checking visible access conditions, observing an exterior fire area, searching a specified open segment, producing current site imagery, or providing an authorized remote view to designated personnel.

The request should distinguish an observation from a determination. A UAS team can document visible or thermal conditions within the sensor and flight limitations; it does not certify structural safety, identify a person from heat alone, guarantee complete search coverage, or replace qualified inspection and command decisions.

Provide the actual operating area, proposed start time, expected duration, known access constraints, nearby airports or heliports, known crewed-aircraft activity, and any temporary restriction or emergency aviation coordination already in effect. The pilot still performs an independent airspace and flight review.

For wildfire, disaster, or other complex aviation environments, the request must identify the controlling or coordinating air-operations contact. A local request does not by itself authorize flight within a Temporary Flight Restriction or around active emergency aircraft.

Report known wires, towers, smoke, fire behavior, hazardous materials, crowds, moving apparatus, unstable ground, restricted areas, hostile activity, sensitive facilities, and radio limitations. Conditions that are obvious to responders on scene may not be obvious to an arriving aviation team.

The remote pilot makes the final aviation go/no-go decision. If conditions are unsuitable, the requestor and pilot may narrow the task, change the timing or location, use another information source, or decline the flight.

Specify how urgent observations will reach the assigned contact, who may view a secured feed, and what should be delivered after the assignment. Live video should support—not replace—the established operational communications path.

The request should also establish whether imagery is operational reference, public information, project documentation, or potential evidence. That decision affects access, naming, transfer, retention, release, and whether an original file must be preserved.