Drone use for businesses to be discussed at UMA conference Aug. 2-4

AUGUSTA — A three-day conference, “Navigating Your Airspace: Drone Applications for Business,” is scheduled for August at the Unmanned Aircraft Vehicle Pilot Training Center at the University of Maine at Augusta.
The conference, presented by New England UAS, will run from Wednesday, Aug. 2 through Friday, Aug. 4.

“Maine is poised to become the training hub for an ever expanding $82 billion industry,” organizers said. “Unmanned aircraft systems, commonly called drones, have important applications with business, science, first responders and the military.”
Tom Abbott, project manager for the training center, said, “UAVs can revolutionize the way we do business. Applications for UAVs are varied and growing” He said that includes business applications such as engineering inspections, monitoring power transmission lines and pipelines, examining crop health in the forest, search and rescue, aerial photography for land surveys, environmental assessments, advertising, video and film production, real estate development and emergency delivery of medicine. “The list of new applications continues to expand,” Abbott said.
The goal of the conference is to bring business owners and aviation experts together to learn more about the equipment required, to understand how drones are operated and to discuss potential business applications for drones.
For more information, go to www.uma.edu/uasconference.