South Africa: Cape Town's investment in drone tech to combat crimes, poaching incidents

South Africa is preparing its ground for using drone technology in its combat against crime. While other African countries like Ghana is utilizing the drone technology to supply essential medical supplies to health facilities and Rwanda to fight malaria, Cape Town is going to become the first municipality in the country to help the government officials fight against crime as the city gets the go-ahead from the Civil Aviation Authority (CAA).

If the Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) gets the green signal to the municipality of Cape Town, it will become the first one (a municipality in South Africa) to undertake an initiative of using drone technology in combating crime. There are no other municipalities in South Africa that are utilizing drones or investigating the use of drones, JP Smith, Mayoral committee member for safety and security said.

According to JP Smith, Cape Town had already invested over R500,000 on drones that would be utilized for pre-operations and post-operations. The city in order to accomplish the task has already sent staff for training but official consent may still take an average time period of one year, he said.

“Drones will be deployed as seen fit by the safety directorate within the legal parameters stipulated. The City of Cape Town staff will be tested by the CAA, which will be the final phase for staff to get their pilot’s licences,” he cited.

The utilization of drone technology will also include diverse commercial and non-commercial activities like anti-poaching operations, aerial surveillance, monitoring services, security and crowd control, scientific research, filming and deliveries to name a few. The incidents of cable theft have been reported in Philippi’s horticulture area and this technology will have an “eye-in-the-sky” which would help in policing and response. “Failure to adhere to civil aviation regulations could result in a 10-year prison sentence or a fine of R50 000,” Kabelo Ledwaba, CAA’s spokesperson said.

The application of drones will have an easy mechanism to handle (with mobile monitoring) and these will be piloted by the trained individuals. The Cape Town municipality will use the technology for varied crime spectrums from poaching to theft including scientific research, journalism, crowd control and filming. While the range of human eyes is quite small, the inbuilt advance technology in these drones are absolutely able to pick up the unwarranted and suspicious activities in areas of interest and the technology will also work out during the evening using thermal infra-red cameras that pick-up body heat and movement.

Similar drone technology has recently been deployed after the killing of 80 animals on farms in Northamptonshire before being butchered and sold illegally to restaurants and shops. The investigating team has launched night drone patrols in Northamptonshire to fight the United Kingdom’s worst rural crime wave in the last seven years. The team wants to investigate the slaughter of sheep with its capability to cover a large area mainly during the night with the thermal imaging.

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