Timberlands takes to the skies
NEW ZEALAND’S LARGEST FOREST GROWER NOW HAS EYES IN the sky to assist in measuring and managing its vast estate in the central North Island.
Timberlands is among the first to adopt the use of Unmanned Aerial Vehicles, better known as drones, as a key tool in its operations.
But instead of outsourcing everything to a professional drone operator, the company has decided to purchase its own fleet of UAVs and train personnel to fly them for a large percentage of that work.
Hazel Swanson, Forest Engineer at Timberlands told the ForestTECH 2017 conference in Rotorua last month that having this facility in-house provides more flexibility for staff to be able to use the new technology at relatively short notice.
For highly technical tasks, such as LiDAR surveys and thermal imaging during fires, it still uses outside expert assistance from Interpine, which has developed a large UAV resource over the past couple of years, including training people to gain flying qualifications and also supplying drones and support equipment.
Ms Swanson says Timberlands has put six of its staff through the comprehensive 5-day training course already and will be training more users in the future. The company currently has two drones in-house.
“We are still learning, but there is potential for UAV’s to become a very useful resource in our toolbox,” she adds.
The Timberlands team has been using the drones this year to map cut-overs and assess post-harvest blocks for any final work that needs to be done prior to re-planting. One hour spent mapping an area from the air can replace countless hours walking the site on foot.
The drones also came into their own during the mid-winter storms that wreaked havoc in parts of Kaingaroa Forest.
Ms Swanson says the drones were able to provide detailed aerial views of slips and damage to tracks, as well as highlighting where debris was littering water courses, so that remediation plans could be drawn up relatively quickly. Some of these localities were only assessible safely by air. It was also used to direct crews to areas where wind-blown trees needed to be salvaged.
Others tasks drones are being used by Timberlands includes making safe behaviour observations of those working and travelling through its forests to support its H&S programme. The ability to view tree falling, processing and other hazardous operations in close proximity, without putting people in danger, is important.
However, operating drones is not as easy as it appears, says Ms Swanson. There are weather-related issues, since UAV’s are not waterproof and cannot be used in the rain and low cloud limits visibility. They are not able to operate in strong winds, either. Other issues facing operators include drones being attacked by birds and taking extra care in the presence of power lines running through the forest, as well as watching for skylines and yarder lines on a landing.
Drones are fragile and can easily be damaged and Ms Swanson cautions others looking at adopting the technology to budget for breakages.
Operational restrictions include drones only able to fly within line of sight and under a maximum 120 metres altitude, as well as away from airports and other aircraft. Also, a drone can usually fly for around 20 minutes on one battery charge, so it would pay to purchase spare batteries for larger jobs.
These negatives are outweighed by the advantage and Ms Swanson says Timberlands is looking to upgrade its drone fleet in the future and wants to get contractors involved with the new technology. There could be opportunities to use drones for flying yarder strawlines across gullies and valleys – Interpine is aiming to develop this capability.
NZL