NOAA Researchers Use UAS to Survey Hawaii Wildlife

Photo courtesy Papahānaumokuākea Marine National Monument

 By Priya Potapragada



NOAA scientists and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service used UAS to study wildlife in the first of two scheduled deployments over the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands from 16-23 June. 



Researchers used an AeroVironment Puma system, which completed seven flights to survey monk seals, sea turtles, sea birds, and vegetation and to look for marine debris in Papahānaumokuākea Marine National Monument. 



“This is a great example of how investing in our ability to deploy state-of-the-art technology to conduct observations in remote locations can provide critical data to help NOAA in our conservation and resilience missions,” says Todd Jacobs, project scientist for NOAA Research’s Unmanned Aircraft Systems Program and lead for the Hawaii missions. “This operation validated our hopes that we can use the aircraft in the monument for a variety of missions without harming the environment to get data that we wouldn’t otherwise get. We were able to survey in remote coves for monk seals and turtles in conditions that we may not have been able to safely land people ashore.”



Researchers were especially pleased with results of the monk seal survey.



“The monk seal mission was wildly successful,” says Charles Littnan, NOAA Pacific Islands Fisheries Science Center lead scientist for the Hawaiian Monk Seal Research Program. “We were able to identify animals on the beach and in the water, identify mother-pup pairs and get a sense of the age class of the animal — all things that are important for population monitoring. The data collected by the Puma will nicely supplement our current hands-on approach to the recovery of the species.” 



The Puma is equipped with real-time video and still photo capability and can fly for up to two hours on a charge and cover a range of about 50 square miles. The UAV is controlled by NOAA’s Office of Marine and Aviation Operations pilots and can be hand-launched from any location on land or at sea from a boat.