San Antonio Fox affiliate KABB became the 10th Sinclair-owned station to launch a drone this week.
“Our viewers love video from drones and we want to provide that view to them as new medium that we can show them news events of all the things we currently cover, but from a different perspective,” said Sinclair UAS chief pilot, Jeff Rose.
In September, we wrote about Sinclair’s commitment to have 80 trained and FAA-certified drone pilots in 40 markets by the end of 2017.
The station put its chief photographer Lalo Garcia and its operations manager Luis Escamilla through training at Virginia Tech University to pass the FAA UAS Pilot Exam.
“Our drone program is off to a great start, with safety being the top priority,” said Rose. “Our policy is to have two operators for each aircraft; one to fly the drone and one to focus solely on the photography. We also meet with local law enforcement as part of our training and before we begin operations. We think establishing coordination protocols at the outset with police, fire and other first responders is critical for the safety of our communities as we incorporate the use of this new technology.”