Hatfield, M., & Nelson, H., & Holst, B., & Radotich, M., & Nelson, T. (2022, August), Enhancing Professional Interdisciplinary Engineering Skills Through the Application of Unmanned Aircraft Systems to Solve Real-World Remote Sensing Missions  Paper presented at 2022 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition, Minneapolis, MN. 10.18260/1-2--41755

\bibitem{asee_peer_41755}
  Hatfield, M., \& Nelson, H., \& Holst, B., \& Radotich, M., \& Nelson, T. (2022, August), \emph{Enhancing Professional Interdisciplinary Engineering Skills Through the Application of Unmanned Aircraft Systems to Solve Real-World Remote Sensing Missions}
  Paper presented at 2022 ASEE Annual Conference \& Exposition, Minneapolis, MN.
  10.18260/1-2--41755

Michael Hatfield, Haley Nelson, Brian Holst, Michael Radotich, and Tad Nelson.  "Enhancing Professional Interdisciplinary Engineering Skills Through the Application of Unmanned Aircraft Systems to Solve Real-World Remote Sensing Missions".  2022 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition, Minneapolis, MN, 2022, August.  ASEE Conferences, 2022.  https://peer.asee.org/41755 Internet.  15 Dec, 2024

\bibitem{asee_peer_41755}
  Michael Hatfield, Haley Nelson, Brian Holst, Michael Radotich, and Tad Nelson.
  "Enhancing Professional Interdisciplinary Engineering Skills Through the Application of Unmanned Aircraft Systems to Solve Real-World Remote Sensing Missions".
  \emph{2022 ASEE Annual Conference \& Exposition, Minneapolis, MN, 2022, August}.
  ASEE Conferences, 2022.
  https://peer.asee.org/41755 Internet.  15 Dec, 2024

@INPROCEEDINGS{asee_peer_41755
author = "Michael Hatfield, Haley Nelson, Brian Holst, Michael Radotich, and Tad Nelson"
title = "Enhancing Professional Interdisciplinary Engineering Skills Through the Application of Unmanned Aircraft Systems to Solve Real-World Remote Sensing Missions"
booktitle = "2022 ASEE Annual Conference \& Exposition"
year = "2022"
month = "August"
address = "Minneapolis, MN"
publisher = "ASEE Conferences"
note = {https://peer.asee.org/41755}
number = {10.18260/1-2--41755}
}

TY  - CPAPER
AB  - Over the past decade unmanned aircraft systems (UAS) have become increasingly popular, affordable, and technically capable. No longer are UAS considered to be simply for recreation and hobby, today’s relatively inexpensive UAS offer significant capabilities for flight and recording of imagery. Combined with the easing of previously onerous Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) rules governing the use of UAS for commercial/professional purposes, these platforms now provide a viable option for scientists and engineers to apply these as tools to conduct remote sensing missions around the world.

While basic operation of UAS may not be considered a major challenge for those willing to learn and practice their skills, this level of training is not always sufficient. For universities or businesses vying for lucrative grants, oftentimes these teams may not be considered competitive without having some level of formal education and experience with UAS/sensor suites. Engineers and scientists may desire to serve as Program Investigators (PI) for grants or as Mission Directors for team flight operations, but often lack practical experience. Likewise, newer UAS pilots may lack requisite technical expertise in UAS/sensor capabilities.

In the academic world, students are also looking for ways to gain practical aerospace engineering, remote sensing, and UAS missions experience. UNIVERSITY course, AERO XXXX, UAS Operations, provides students with the opportunity to gain this expertise while solving a real-world mission requirement in arctic research, public service missions, or supporting critical infrastructure. The course provides students with the knowledge and tools needed to serve in the role of Mission Director for UAS flight operations for remote sensing missions, and to successfully compete for technical grants involving UAS operations.

In the inaugural offering of AERO XXXX, UAS Operations during the spring of 2021, students tackled several real-world mission sets, including watershed drainage, support for mining exploration, and the environmental and safety impacts of glacial melt in nearby Juneau and Valdez glaciers. Students came away from the course with a grounded understanding of the capabilities and limitations of UAS, how UAS/sensors could best be applied to mission campaigns, how tradeoffs in capability/cost can affect mission planning, experience with data analysis and rendering tools, experience liaising with professional UAS flight operations teams, hands on experience with consumer-grade UAS, and in creation of technical documents and multimedia capturing their results.

This paper details the course organization, how it has been structured to satisfy the diverse interests of our student population in tackling important contemporary issues with modern technology (while doing so with limited university resources), how this body of experience is expected to help them in their own careers and endeavors, and how that experience ultimately strengthens the university program for future students. The paper is coauthored by a student who took the course (participating in the Juneau/Valdez glacier studies) and by the course instructor, providing perspectives from both a personal and institutional point of view.

AU  - Michael Hatfield
AU  - Haley Nelson
AU  - Brian Holst
AU  - Michael Radotich
AU  - Tad Nelson
CY  - Minneapolis, MN
DA  - 2022/08/23
PB  - ASEE Conferences
TI  - Enhancing Professional Interdisciplinary Engineering Skills Through the Application of Unmanned Aircraft Systems to Solve Real-World Remote Sensing Missions
UR  - https://peer.asee.org/41755
DO  - 10.18260/1-2--41755
ER  -