Drones spotted over the Glass House Mountains

Is it a bird? Is it a plane? No it’s a UAV

Residents and visitors to the Glass House Mountains region may see an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) flying over pine plantations in local state forests this week.

The fixed-wing UAV, operated by locally based Ninox Robotics, has a 2.75m wingspan and looks like a small aeroplane. The UAV will capture high resolution aerial imagery of young plantations for HQPlantations.

Operating under a commercial UAV licence granted by CASA, the remotely piloted UAV will be flown near Landsborough, Beerwah, Glass House Mountains and Woodford Monday-Friday, July 22-26.

HQPlantations resource information manager Lee Stamm said the data obtained from the surveys would allow HQPlantations to optimise the management of the crop.

Previously the company purchased generic aerial survey photography from local government taken by light aircraft.

“The precision gained from this new approach will influence nutrition management, weed control and other factors that improve growth,” Mr Stamm said.

To perform this work, the UAV will fly about 350m above the ground at speeds of around 70km per hour.

“Ninox Robotics systems are highly capable, quiet and safe tools for gathering aerial intelligence,” Mr Stamm said. To allay concerns, he said imagery would only be recorded over the plantation licence area and HQPlantations’ freehold property.

“People don’t need to be concerned if they see it flying overhead en route to the plantations as it will not be filming then,” he said.

Plantation health is important to the region as almost all the timber harvested locally is processed at the AKD sawmill in Caboolture and is used in local residential and commercial construction. All areas where trees are harvested are then replanted in a continuous cycle that makes wood the ultimate renewable.