Uncrewed Aerial Systems (UAS) collective learning: applied research in operational environments

Much has been written about policies, workflows, and challenges of applied sUAS research. The rapid growth of the sUAS market, and its wide range of applications across disciplines, has made collective (collaborative) learning beyond the written often difficult to keep contemporary. Collective learning is defined as the ability of groups of individuals to share and accumulate knowledge, discoveries, and innovation together efficiently, and timely. Collective learning is vital in a fast-moving geotechnical landscape in order to accumulate and share such knowledge. The challenges associated with facilitating such learning and research design into an applied and operational landscape are also numerous. This presentation draws on the results and experience gained during sUAS tornado damage survey fieldwork. It demonstrates how innovative application and custom operational design have produced unique data and results. It also presents critical thought on how sUAS research in hazard environments has become more interoperable and impactful by design, along with ways to improve collective learning in this field going forward.