The use of drones in Construction

Today unmanned aerial vehicle or more commonly known as drone is used in different fields: agriculture, construction, energy, mine etc.

Interestingly, that France is one of the first countries that enacted regulations for the use of commercial drones in 2012 and now use them actively for commercial purposes. Whereas in the United States the use of drones is more complicated because of the absence of formal regulations. Federal Aviation Administration should grant an exemption for the use of commercial drones.

So what’s so special in drones that they become an essential tool in construction project management?

One of drones features is surveillance. Instead of using human resources and different heavy surveying tools, drone can do the same work covering fast big distances and delivering accurate data. It will save time and contractor’s money.

Another drone’s feature is a real time data on job progress. This will keep the client or the project manager informed about the latest construction progress. Plus, it allows to keep an eye on worker’s activity.

Thirdly, during construction not all defects may be seen, especially in remote places. So with a help of drone you may identify potential hazards or quality issues. In this way, it will reduce risks for workers and lowers their injuries at the construction site.

Fourthly, drone may provide an inspection of construction for example, in bridge construction when visual inspection of bridge underside is required. It is possible to do that with a help of support but at the same time the observation may be limited, especially if the bridge is long and over the water. By using drone experts can get detailed view of the bridge components and in less time.

Finally, drone can monitor construction sites, especially if the construction manager has to attend multiple sites. Launching up a drone to monitor the progress, work, safety standards etc will save energy, time and money.

As a matter of fact, a drone helps acquire other useful information in a very expeditious and cost-efficient manner.

Nowadays many companies are using drones in different fields of business, among them such giants as Bouygues Construction, Vinci, SNCF etc.

With all drone’s advantages there is one thing that should be taken into consideration that is data collection and processing, where should it be stored. For such purposes, you need to turn to specialist or experts in this domain. For example, Redbird has created the most advanced online platform to collect and process drone data in the cloud which enable customers to easily access, annotate, share, and collaborate with drone based information.

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