Licensed Drone Pilot Role Description

Retrievers Drone Pilot

We are presently recruiting for qualified drone pilots in the following areas: St. Cloud, Brainerd Lakes, East Metro.

About the Retrievers

The Retrievers is an all-volunteer team based in Minnesota offering the tools, experience and expertise to help rescues and individual owners find their lost dogs.  Our team approach leverages lost dog behavior expertise, our specialized humane trapping tools, social media presence and technology, including drones, to locate and retrieve lost dogs.

About the Drone Team

The Retrievers Drone Team consists of licensed professional drone pilots located across our operating region of Minnesota, Wisconsin, Iowa, South Dakota and North Dakota, flying one of the Retrievers’ Mavic 3T, Matrice 4T, Matrice 4TD drones, or owner-operated enterprise thermal drones.

The team supports a drone as first response model and conducts initial response flights and a variety of flight missions, including flights to assist in locating a dog for a hand catch, conducting observational flights to help our case managers plan for camera, feeding station and trap placement, and conducting other flights to assist our case manager and ground teams as needed.

In addition to operational and training flights, our pilots may be called upon for public relations presentations, educational events, and similar activities.

A typical mission

No two missions are the same.  A flight mission may involve:

  • Contacting a client to confirm information provided on the online request for assistance form, gathering additional information and providing initial information and critical next steps
  • Pre-flight planning to identify the operational area for a search
  • Identifying obstacles and other hazards present in the search area
  • Securing permission for launching points or special airspace use
  • Filing NOTAMs if operating in proximity to airports
  • Driving 40-90 miles to the search area
  • Conducting a multi-hour flight search using thermal, IR and visible light sensors and both manual and autonomous flight searches to attempt to locate a lost dog
  • Reviewing images captured during a search to locate areas for further investigation
  • Coordinating a ground response or hand catch
  • Reporting back information about the search area, location of where a dog was discovered, or other key information collected during the mission
  • Working closely with our case managers and ground teams to support their work

What’s required as drone pilot

  • Valid 107 certificate
  • At least 50 hours of drone flight experience on DJI, Autel or Skydio platforms
  • Ability to travel 40-90 miles to search areas
  • Ability to fly at least 4 missions per month
  • Given the functionality of thermal imaging the ability to fly missions during hours of darkness
  • Additional flight experience and completion of Retrievers advanced operations training If operating under a waiver (BVLOS, weather minimums)
  • Ability to participate in training and on-boarding flights and complete a standardized training program
  • Experience working with VOs
  • Complete appropriate post-flight log entries, inspections and maintain flight and inspection logs in AirData UAV.

General requirements

  • Ability to work in a dynamic team environment, including in ambiguous situations
  • Ability to interact with clients experiencing the loss of a dog with empathy and professionalism
  • Familiarity with Google Earth, Google apps, and UAS piloting apps
  • Excellent communication skills
  • Strict adherence to client and team confidentiality
  • Enjoy working as part of a team of highly motivated and dedicated experts in lost dog search
  • Facebook account (needed to access the Retrievers’ team internal group communications) and access to Messenger
  • Willing and able to use your own drone if a team drone is not available to assign to you
    • Preferred owner-operated drones: Mavic 3T/TA, Matrice 4T/TD, Matrice 30T, Matrice 300/350/400 with H20T or H30T sensor payload, Skydio X10
    • If using a personal drone, you must have a MN Commercial Operations License, carry liability insurance of at least $1 million, and drones must be registered with MN DOT
    • Pilots may not accept payment or donations for lost dog searches conducted through the Retrievers or independently

Desirable:

  • Experience with advanced operational planning, including working in proximity to airports, controlled and restricted airspace
  • Familiarity with AirData UAV, DJI FlightHub 2 or Skydio Remote Flight Deck platforms
  • Familiarity with Foreflight and ADS-B In systems
  • Flexible schedule to deploy on an emergency basis
  • Willingness to routinely respond to cases within one hour of the pilot’s home and within 90 minutes of a pilot’s home on an emergency basis
  • Experience with thermal drones