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Waterloo Fire seeks permission to pursue grants to stand up a drone rescue team
Summary
Lieutenant Mike Zimmerly asked council permission to seek grant funding to form a departmental drone rescue team, describing faster search-and-rescue capability, thermal imaging benefits and FAA Part 107 and organizational COA requirements; staff said grants are mostly 100% and earliest realistic deployment would likely be 2027.
Lieutenant Mike Zimmerly of Waterloo Fire Rescue asked the council at the April 6 work session for permission to pursue grants and begin forming a drone rescue team, stressing that his request was for authority to apply for funding rather than for immediate city purchases.
Zimmerly said drones equipped with thermal imagers and two-way communications can shorten searches from hours to minutes and increase success rates, citing local examples and peer departments that operate dedicated teams. He explained that individual pilots must hold FAA…
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