NOAA Unmanned Aircraft Systems

Upcoming Gulf Region UAS Applications Conference

The Gulf of Mexico region faces some of the most pressing environmental issues of our day, including hurricanes, hypoxia, wetland loss, ecosystem degradation, and water quality. To protect and enhance ecosystem and community resiliency, science must go beyond the current state-of-the-art in collecting critical data from the ocean and atmosphere. One of the emerging sensor platforms that has the potential to make significant advancements in this regard is Unmanned Aircraft Systems (UAS). While the potential benefits of UAS technologies are great, efficient use of this emerging resource is needed if we are to effectively meet the diverse needs of the Gulf community.

To meet these needs, the Northern Gulf Institute and NOAA will be holding a Gulf Region Unmanned Aircraft Systems Applications Conference on April 1, 2008 in Biloxi, Mississippi. The overarching charge of this conference is for regional constituents to come together and establish requirements that are best met through the use of UAS technologies. This workshop will rely upon a broad group of local, state, regional and federal stakeholders to help define UAS-based operational and research requirements that are specifically designed to help better understand, monitor, forecast and mitigate the potentially devastating impacts hurricanes can have on the Gulf coast community.

For more information on this conference, go to http://www.northerngulfinstitute.org/uas