Episode 217: Creative Rescues: Drones & Robots at FDNY with Scott Schmidt & Frank Montana

Published 2024-05-09

Episode notes

Why are creativity and curiosity critical for robotics?

Hello Smart Firefighting Community!

Welcome to another episode of covering real world innovations via interviews with fire service and technology industry experts that empower YOU to develop your very own Smart Firefighting strategy!

Welcome back to this 20-episode Texas Robotics Summit Mini Series! This 4 day event (March 4-7, 2024) was hosted at the Reveille Peak Ranch and by our friends at Granite Defense , and showcased the use of robotics (air/water/ground) in public safety via keynote presentations, training scenario stations, roundtable conversations, and more.

In this episode:

FDNY's creative robotics solutions for emergency response

The power of teamwork in public safety innovation

The evolving landscape of EMS and firefighting technology

Find out from FDNY's Scott Schmidt and Frank Montana !

Scott and Frank discuss their experiences and initiatives in utilizing robotics and drones in emergency response. In particular, they highlight the importance of collaboration and creativity in finding innovative solutions.

The duo also covers their background and road to FDNY Robotics, the use of drones in EMS and firefighting, the integration of robots in collapse situations, and the future of technology in first response. Overall, the conversation emphasizes the limitless potential of robotics in improving safety and efficiency in emergency situations.

So click play now to hear what they have to share! And stay tuned for the next Mini Series episode!

Head to www.smartfirefighting.com to discover how SFF accelerates innovation for emergency responders, to find out when our next event is, or review our curated resources!

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Chapters

0:00 Kevin's intro: the Texas Robotics Summit mini-series
0:45 Scott Schmidt and Frank Montana of FDNY join
1:24 First time at the summit: collaboration of ideas
2:54 Frank's road from EMS to FDNY Robotics
6:58 Scott's road to the robotics unit
8:28 The scale of FDNY calls
9:43 Thinking creatively: what ideas stick
10:13 The shark watch and life safety mission
11:51 Delivering medical equipment and testing ground robots
14:21 How drones help on the fireground
16:12 The Ann Street parking garage collapse
18:18 What's ahead: more robots and mass casualty incidents
20:40 A team of creative people
22:18 How far New York City has come with technology
23:43 Parting thoughts: no idea is a bad idea
25:26 Scott turns the question on Kevin
27:27 Creativity, curiosity and not taking no for an answer
29:14 Closing thanks

Questions answered in this episode

How does FDNY use drones in fire operations?

Scott Schmidt says FDNY responds with drones at second alarm and above, providing an operational perspective from any side of the building. They use thermal imaging to locate hot spots through smoke, helping to isolate fire locations and reduce operational time, which improves safety for firefighters and cuts down the time buildings are exposed to smoke.

Hear it at 14:44

What life-saving work did FDNY do with drones at the beach?

Frank Montana describes how the unit flew shark watch missions that became life-saving operations. They spot swimmers in distress and people caught in rip tides, then deploy resto tubes, inflatable drop devices, that automatically inflate so someone can grab on. In one case, they spotted a person in a riptide and directed off-duty lifeguards to the exact location within 10 seconds.

Hear it at 10:13

How is FDNY using ground robots like Spot?

Frank Montana says Spot was used at the Ann Street parking garage collapse to navigate an unstable structure and locate a victim without risking firefighters. The unit also uses Spot in subway tunnels where visibility is poor, and has equipped one with an arm to open doors and turn valves, and another with metering for hazmat response.

Hear it at 16:12

What EMS uses for drones is FDNY exploring?

Frank Montana says the unit is working on aerial triage for large casualty incidents, using drones to locate critical patients at the core of an event so resources can be directed there first instead of working from the outside in. They are also testing air drops of trauma kits and flying blood for on-scene transfusions, and have used ground robots to deliver antidote kits in subway drills.

Hear it at 18:41

How many EMS calls does FDNY handle daily?

Frank Montana says on an ambulance, FDNY does about 5,000 EMS runs per day and is getting close to 6,000, with only about 4,000 EMTs in New York City running maybe 600 ambulances. Units are sitting on street corners picking up calls, easily doing 10, 12, or 14 calls in a 12-hour day.

Hear it at 2:54

Transcript

Machine transcript of the published audio. Names may be misspelled and some sections are missing.

Ep 217 transcript

Creative Rescues: Drones & Robots at FDNY with Scott Schmidt & Frank Montana

Speakers: Kevin Sofen, Frank Montana, Scott Schmidt

Source: Whisper medium.en machine transcription of the published Podbean audio (no original transcript found in Drive), lightly cleaned. Speakers were separated by voice clustering and then checked and assigned by hand at every speaker change. Gaps where the model returned no usable text are marked [inaudible m:ss].

[0:00] Kevin Sofen: Welcome to a 20-episode mini-series at the Texas Robotics Summit, hosted by our friends at Granite Defense. We dive into the evolving world of drones and robotics in public safety aviation. Through 20 fantastic conversations with leaders across public safety, from the fire service, law enforcement, EMS operations, wildlife management, and more, we explore the challenges, investments in the critical role of technology in enhancing emergency services operations. A special thanks to the sponsor of the Smart Firefighting Podcast, W.S. Darley & Company, for making this podcast possible. Enjoy the show. Day two of the Texas Robotics Summit, sitting alongside Scott Schmidt, firefighter and UAS pilot at FDNY, and Frank Montana, UAS pilot for FDNY, EMT for FDNY, HAZTAC instructor and also chief of Merrick FD. What's going on guys?

[1:01] Frank Montana: How's it going? Thanks for having us.

[1:02] Scott Schmidt: Yeah.

[1:03] Kevin Sofen: How are you doing there? Dude, I'm just doing well. It's been a good day. It's fun to just sort of see all this come to life. I mean, kudos to the Granite Defense team pulling this all together. I know a lot of planning, but it seems like each every hour on the hour there's been something. But for you guys, have you, what have you taken from the summit so far and have you kind of what sort of events and sessions have you attended or partook in?

[1:24] Frank Montana: So definitely it was overwhelming. wasn't expecting this for our first time coming out and seeing what the robotics community is about. We definitely sat on a few conferences, a couple things with NIST, a few things with other different vendors and went out there, did a little bit of flying with the NIST and the United States Air Force. And it was great doing a little search and rescue, little courses, definitely just trying to challenge ourselves and see what we can bring home back to New York City, what works for us but doesn't and you know share that knowledge

[1:54] Scott Schmidt: yeah definitely more of a collaboration with the other companies out there with the other departments and stuff because there's a lot of ideas it's an evolution we're constantly growing and get a lot of takeaways from working with other people you know you definitely want to reach out to other departments for their ideas people reaching out to us how do we establish a drone department we're on a big scale but you know we definitely spoke to other departments out there and what they're doing how do they respond so it's definitely collaboration of ideas

[2:18] Kevin Sofen: Yeah, no, that's awesome. That's the beauty of coming together in real life and kind of touching the tech and then being able to talk to each other and frankly doing in-person podcasts like this is way better than over Zoom screens. But yeah, I'd love to kind of hear both of your backstory too, and ultimately your road to the FDNY robotics and whatnot. But Frank, I think even I was, we were talking last night, I was really interested in some of the stuff that you were doing from an EMS standpoint, as well as kind of your background in volunteer firefighter, but give me a little background in terms of ultimately Like what was your road to ultimately getting involved with all the FDNY robotics initiatives?

[2:54] Frank Montana: So yeah, my, I guess public service or first responder role kind of started when I was a kid. I always wanted to be a fireman. I always wanted, I was into the job. I used to wear the little bunker gear costume to the beach. My mom would yell at me, but I was into it and I really loved it. And I'm a buff, I'll call it right out. So when I became of age, joined 19, I joined my local firehouse, Merrick Truck, To the boys who do listen and you know kind of from there I just got exposed to the whole fire service and saw the ways I can go about into now making this my career signed up in 2016 for the FDNY EMT test 2017 went through the Academy and Did that it was great time got sent to East New York Brooklyn was on an ambulance there for two years Got transferred over to South Jamaica Queens was on an ambulance there for two years So some pretty busy spots learned a lot met a lot of people got a you know Indulge in different cultures, which was really cool get a you know, see New York City for what people don't get to see You know, everyone sees Times Square. Everyone sees the Statue of Liberty No one gets to see you know The background the other five boroughs how busy it can be on an ambulance on average we do about five thousand EMS runs And that was when I was on an ambulance per day her day We're going we're getting close to six thousand and there's only four thousand EMCs in New York City And we maybe run six hundred ambulances, you know, we're sitting on street corners where we're picking up calls You know, you're easy to do 10 12 14 calls and in a 12-hour day It's just it is what it is, but we're there for the people were there for the city You know, they love us they come out and just turn around do it all over again and you know I admire the work that everyone else does because it's it's you know It's a thankless job guys are doing it and you know You got to see all walks of life and you have some great people and in this career path who? Really generally just want to help people So I did a little bit of time of that I went to a specialty unit that dealt with hazmat in the medical management aspect So if we have a you know a patient who was exposed to some type of hazardous material Not only can we treat that with special protocols? But we could don proper PPE and CPC go into those environments and start getting those people Treatment and getting them out there. So the end of the day, you know, we want more people to live, you know and I'm glad that the department is as progressive it is to be that aggressive to look for better ways we can treat people and almost spearheading that department for the rest of the country in the world. So I did that for a few years. The opportunity came up to teach hazmat and you know it's the has tack battalion for the FDNY and you know it was like it's great opportunity absolutely loved it. I did that for about two years and teaching is you know getting to take all that knowledge and you got away you know see in the field and now being able to pass that on to the next group and it was unbelievable and it was very rewarding and I loved it and you know the people up there are great it's a lot of work I give them props it's eight guys who do hundreds of difference of things many different programs but they get it done and it's it's great to see so from that my background I got into aviation when I was a kid I love airplanes and I still do ended up getting my pilot's license and fly on the side for fun and my captain at the time said oh the robotics unit is doing something with us for some big conference you should go with them and kind of piggybacked off that I bet Kat and Mike Leo and he was great and he said to me he's like hey you know we would like to have look down this avenue how can we bring modern technology into pre-hospital care how can we bridge that can you come up with some ideas and I said yeah he's like all right so shortly enough next thing I know it pulled me from teaching and now here I am with the robotics unit working with Scott and a bunch of great guys who definitely showed me the way of how to be a great drone pilot in one of the most major cities in the world and along with other you know systems that we have going on so it's been it's been pretty rewarding I've only been there almost a year and happy every day every day is a great day to come to work

[6:45] Kevin Sofen: only about a thousand questions I want to build on top of that but I want to Scott I want to see you kind of a little bit of kind of your road to ultimately the fdmy robotics program now and then you know after that when I kind of bounced off.

[6:58] Scott Schmidt: My story's a little shorter. I got 20 years, got on in 03, took the test, got on. And technology wasn't around like that at all. 15 years working in the field. And at some point, you want to look for other avenues and stuff. Life gets in the way of things. Test for lieutenant and stuff. But beyond that, I have a background in environmental science. I see a lot of crossovers. One of my friends that's in the unit, Joe Cruz, he kept on saying, you should really look into this. So got my license, looked into it. And it really opened up my eyes operationally for this job. You know, and you're at the front seat of the best thing, well, the craziest thing that's gonna happen for the day. You get to see the job in a different perspective and you know what, it changed the perspective for a lot of other people. So after 15 years, I got my 107 and worked my way into the unit. It wasn't established yet, made my sacrifices working downtown at headquarters at FDOC at the operations center. We used to, we responded out of that. So I've been in the unit, COVID messes me up about four years now, and it's been growing exponentially. So being down there, we started with basics, just an officer and a pilot. We've grown so much right now, where you have the VO, data specialist. So as far as the robotics, it's grown tremendously. Open up my eyes, I'm not a very techie person, but I have learned a lot, you know, mapping 3D, 2D maps. It's just, the technology's incredible. So increase my longevity, you know, and I have a lot of insight from working on the job. So, but like from an operational perspective, you know, opens up your eyes, especially for the chiefs, take a step back, especially from 100 feet up looking, really changes things. So that's how I got into the robotics.

[8:28] Kevin Sofen: I love it. And I think a lot of people look to FDNY as sort of this behemoth in terms of what it is and the sheer volume, you just mentioned 5,000 EMS calls. How many fire calls a day?

[8:41] Scott Schmidt: There's probably about, I think, I don't know how it's done, yeah, about 2,000. I don't know if it's done by borough or is it citywide, but I know I've worked up in the Bronx and I would always measure the day based on how many incidents it is. And if it's like over 500, all right, it's a steady day, but then if it gets up 2,000, crazy. So, but that could be just for the borough. So it's very busy.

[9:02] Kevin Sofen: So it's obviously no doubt a unique scope within the American context. And there's obviously some other large cities, but I'm interested in sort of where you're at now and kind of thinking about some of these best practices and initiatives that you've started. And I know from some of the stuff we were talking about and what you were working on with kind of the hybrid of EMS and being able to, I had Frank and Mike on the air today talking about how you're being able to drop things with drones and deliver things with drones and how the drone can be a vehicle to whether it's delivering medicine or delivering something that could save someone for various application. Like talk me through and how did that come to fruition and what's going on with how you're leveraging?

[9:43] Scott Schmidt: Just thinking, what ideas, how to be creative. You know, where can we be impactful? You know, just any idea. for last year was ... broccoli beaches you know the shark incident or can give eyes but now we have a deployment system that we do with the rest of itself is a life-saving situation that we can provide help And if the lifeguards can't reach it we can provide you know the rest tubes I'm just thinking outside the box in any you know could we help the blood center to transport blood or something like that so Just whatever you think of throw it on the table. See what sticks

[10:13] Frank Montana: Yes, Scott said like a big thing We did this past summer was a life safety mission it started off as a shark watch And then we really learned quickly that this is more than just looking for wildlife And you know potential shark incidents this was more or less you know looking for swimmers in distress rip tides people caught in rip tides and now the ability for us to deploy you know resto tubes these inflatable drop devices where they automatically inflate someone can grab onto it and we're saving a life now using technology to save a life is what it's about this is what we're here for not only for accountability and safety but we can now spot people we can physically do that rescue with the technology at hand while we were down at the beach last year we were flying and we saw someone call in Riptide the lifeguards were off duty and they just happened to be hanging out with us you know just talking about the day and we were able to just say hey the gentleman's right there point right to him within 10 seconds they were on scene getting them out of the water and you know without that who knows what could have happened so to be able to see that firsthand that technology is working it is working in the public safety it is saving lives you know it's it's great and one thing that i love about the fire service is like there's so many ways to get the task done but none of them are wrong and i think that's really cool that now this is just another avenue, another tool that we can use to help people and get them out of a bad situation. And as far as the medical aspects, you know, a few things that I look at is how can we make that pre-hospital care setting better? How can we take a drone or, you know, a ground robot, the spot, the robot dog and make our job easier in the long run? I mean, you know, I see it more with critical incidents, but delivering medical equipment is simple enough. You know, we're kind of toying with the idea of building our own trauma kits and having them air drops for you know a large casualty incident and we've had them in the past we've had the West Side highway ramming you know something like the Boston Marathon bombing an unfortunate incident but we can look at that and say hey how can we respond to something like this with the technology that we have make that chance for survival that much greater because at the end of the day we just want people to live and we want to give them that chance to go on and do what they need to do in life so if we have the technology available to us how can we manipulate it to complete that task? So looking at trauma kits, as Scott said, flying blood, that's something that they're looking to do is fly blood around the city and being able to do on scene blood transfusions, which we're working with Dr. Isaacs, he's big on that, and it's great. So things are coming around. We've even touched base a little bit. We're a very big city of being prepared for the worst. It's New York City, the worst case scenario, it's what we're prepared for every day. So if you name it, CBRN events, things like that, we're prepared for it. We do a lot of drilling with chemicals and biological agents, things like that. So we've even tested using our ground robots, using our Spot Dog to come deliver antidote kits for chemical warfare agents in a subterranean subway tunnel drill. And it works out great, where now that's two less people manpower that you have to use to do logistics. We can use robots to do that's two more people now you can use to go you know help treat people and get these people because at the end of the day that's what's gonna change the tide that's what's gonna keep that count of survivability that much higher and the chances of people walking out of these you know incidents that much greater so that's that's what we're looking to do and a lot of its safety too you know if

[13:43] Scott Schmidt: it prevents a member being committed into an ideal H we'd like to prevent that so we could do reconnaissance with it hazmat situations meters drop the drone in there it can sit there and just monitor do reconnaissance for them before we even have to suit up and commit to somebody so it's just a lot of advantages but a lot of it's it's also just safety we don't want to put our members in a jeopardizing situation like say from a fire situation we have a new perspective with the roof with the thermal we can see hot spots a lot of its safety but we're definitely thinking outside the box and how we could implement the technology but a lot of its safety you know definitely we're always thinking of our members operating one

[14:19] Kevin Sofen: and a lot of good examples of EMS and then a couple there on fire and I'd love to kind of expand upon that as far as you know in its simplest form. The drone is creating data and there's different payloads you could put onto it and then it's streamed and then you ultimately are viewing it in different capacities. What are some maybe other use cases or wins that the New York Fire Department has that you could share about how a drone has helped within a firefighting operation?

[14:44] Scott Schmidt: We respond second-alarm and above and we give an operational perspective from Whatever side that you want now typically when a chief pulls up They're looking at the front of the building like anybody else is right and then you depend on the information that's provided from your officers On the fire floor wherever they are in whatever sector So now, you know, you want to know what's going on the rear, you know You don't want to know logistics access means of egress and stuff. So by providing that perspective, you know We can look for hot spots with thermal imaging and kind of isolate and locate certain areas That may be a danger that members won't aren't aware of, you know we could see through the smoke with the IR so we can just you know we can transmit that information to the fire ground reduce operational time you know instead of back in the day just putting a tower ladder and just hit the roof until it's out you know it would take a long longer time now we can isolate the location junkyard fires very hard to go to put out because usually it's smoldering debris at the base of it you got cars and metal whatever it just in the way so operationally cut down that time and then so we could target the fire and then you know reduce any hazards you know all that smoke is bad we don't want any members to really be committed to that. So from a fire perspective, it reduces the, helps add another tool to hopefully assist in the operational, reduce the operational time and safety for those members operating.

[15:58] Kevin Sofen: It may be even the, we heard it the other day, talking to Frank and Mike about the land robots in different kind of, you know, the infamous spot, which the mayor has talked about. But yeah, why is that a tool in the tool shed and how is it being used?

[16:12] Frank Montana: So, recently, I would say, maybe last spring, we had the Ann Street collapse. There's a parking garage in downtown Manhattan, and unfortunately, building, whatever the case is, it came down. Unfortunately, there was one loss of life. It was the parking attendant, but we knew that there was someone in there. We knew the building itself was not structurally sound, and we don't want to commit our resources. We don't want to commit our manpower in there, because we don't want them to get hurt. That's the end of the day. We want everyone to go home. So we were able to use Spot, navigate inside this structure that's coming around, and we're able to identify that, you know, there's our victim, there he is, and, you know, okay, we don't need to be sending any manned resources in here because there's that, you know, what's the risk versus reward? There is no reward, unfortunately, you know, it's a recovery, but now we can at least dictate that without having to put a manpower in there. And if we can send anyone home at the end of the day, regardless of what technology it is, it's worth it. So it was great to see that, and that was one of its first use cases and you know subterranean response is big like we're down in the subways where we're having you know a hard time navigating it's hard time to vent you know with a lot of smoke we can see through that with spot with the thermal ability and hazmat you know we have we're currently in possession of two spot robots one is getting set up for metering and then the other one has the arm and we can you know manipulate objects we can open doors we can turn valves you know i look at it as if we can send this down and we can meter properly all right We know what we're dealing with. We know what type of PPE we have to select. And we're not wasting time figuring that out. We can get in there, do the job safely, save time, and be efficient about it. And I think that's all around what the job loves to see. People going home, and we're doing it quickly, efficiently, and without any, and safely. That's kind of what it comes down to.

[17:58] Kevin Sofen: Yeah. You guys are doing awesome work. And I appreciate leadership at New York has put in place, as well as just what you guys are doing. I mean, you're really doing a good job kind of executing and showing that what can be done. I mean, I'd love to kind of now hear your perspective on, while you've accumulated and you've done some great stuff, what's next? In the next nine months, next three to five years, where do you see, again, it doesn't necessarily 100% have to be just robotics, but where else do you see where technology can be a piece of the puzzle with a force multiplier to help first responders make better decisions and ultimately make sure that they're safer in helping save lives and property.

[18:41] Frank Montana: Yeah, so I mean, and I would say in the next several months we're definitely gonna see some more robots getting integrated into our day-to-day operations. We're currently looking at a couple of tracked robots for firefighting and other mission-specific jobs. We're looking at Thermite, we're looking at Colossus, and they each are great robots, and we're trying to figure out how can we work that into our big city plan. You know, again, safety is number one. We don't want to put anyone in a bad spot if we don't have to. And if we can put a robot there to do the job, great. And no one's going to get hurt, even better. That's what we're here for. You know, I personally would like to see, and I think we're going that way, is a little bit more integration with EMS, more on a day-to-day operation and getting that more, you know, mainstream, because you don't see much of it out there's not much to, you know, like, oh, what are other people doing? It's just really us and Austin, Travis County, and that's all I've heard of, as much as research as I've done. And we're always looking for ideas, looking to make things better. We're pushing the big thing for aerial triage. If we do have a large-scale MCI, usually the root of it, where the core center is, that's where you're gonna find your critical patients, and on the outside, you're gonna find your more stable patients. But as everything works, we always work from the outside in. When we're working from that outside in and we're dealing with those stable patients, who are wasting time to get to those critical. patients, if I can tell you where all those critical patients are, I can get my resources directed right there and give these people a chance to have a real good chance of surviving that incident. And I think that's big. You know, being able to place resources exactly where they need to be at the right time instead of, you know, that time delay, because it is New York City, it is hard to get as big as it is. And we have traffic, resources do sometimes take time to get there. And if we can mitigate that by using technology, absolutely. And this thing comes into play where we can now do airdrops, we can do the logistics aspect. So we're not having people run them back to get equipment. We can just deliver it while they're operating in the field.

[20:40] Scott Schmidt: Let me see. You do deal with a lot of research. So you're constantly thinking, you know what? I'm in the field operating. So a lot of times it comes down to where's the future bring us? I don't know. It's like sometimes you don't realize it until you don't have something and then you gotta be creative. And then that's where you start spitballing ideas. Again, throw it on the table. How can we come across this? So, you know, communicating. So where the technology is gonna be, I don't know, but it's moving fast and before you know it's here. So it really comes down to, I'm in the field, we have ideas, these guys will think of stuff to help. But these guys, Frank and Andrew, they work on the side. They bust their butt a lot and to discover that new technology that's out there. And when we're in the field, we come across roadblocks. How can we use technology to help us in the future? So being creative. John Wakey in the unit, and Tommy Campos did great, and Joe Cruz did great with the 3D printing and stuff. So we make our own parts, being creative. It's just a lot of creativity, and it's a collective of a lot of smart people. Not me, but them.

[21:36] Kevin Sofen: Yeah, hey, surround yourself with smart, creative people. That's it, that's it.

[21:40] Scott Schmidt: Usually good things happen. But we all have a unique tool to add to the unit and stuff. So it's gonna be interesting the next five years. I can't imagine. But coming here, bouncing ideas. Again, you collaborate with a lot of other agencies. What problems did they come across? And then, oh, you just spark ideas. So working with people, talking with people, there's all the drop devices that are here. What was their evolution to get to that idea? And a lot of people are just, you know, Game Warden from Texas, I was talking to the gentleman earlier, you know, he was a trapper as a kid. So what did he use to help devise? You should see his device. It's pretty ingenious. They made it in-house. So the creativity's out there. It's gonna be incredible the next five years.

[22:18] Frank Montana: Yeah, just to piggyback a little bit, you know, seeing how far New York City has come with integrating technology into just our day-to-day jobs. We have cell phones, tablets, all that. We have this RIT department, the Bureau of Technology and Development Services. They're phenomenal. They really are the backbone of the department. We were up there not too long ago, and they're saying that they serve as something close to almost 20,000 devices for one department. That's impressive. We're at that point where everyone almost has a cell phone. Everyone has technology in their hand. And from just admin to logistics to first response, you're getting that information, which it's great to see. It's great to see that the department is going that way. The department is invested in it and it's trying to forefront. It is the FDNY, it is a big department, but they've taken ideas from everyone, as we should. We're all doing the same mission. We're all looking to just make our lives easier and make it safer and help people. It's great that we can do that. There is no big rivalries, as they say. There might be some, but not when it comes to the mission.

[23:24] Kevin Sofen: All fun love. Yeah. Well, man, this has been awesome. I appreciate just all the context and the history and the story, and then also just some of the great use cases. And I've been doing this mini series of kind of throwing a little kind of final monkey wrench at you guys, as far as a mic drop moment of sorts of, if you have a kind of a question that you could leave us with, a challenge, a favorite quote, a favorite word, or it doesn't necessarily have to be robotics related, but anything that either of you could, both of you if possible, leave us with here today.

[23:56] Frank Montana: I think one of the best things, again, like that I've learned is just that the most valuable tool in my opinion in the fire service is it's not so much the fire trucks or the ambulances or the tools on the truck, but it's the member. Everyone invests so much time in themselves to train and be proficient at their job. I believe General Patton said it, The most important thing is what's in between someone's ears. It's you. It's your brain. That is what makes the drive and makes you as a person and as a whole as a department want to be better and want to hit that next step and, you know, lead from the front, spearhead that next move, that next stepping stone, and especially for us in technology, it comes very quickly. You know, once we learn something, there's something new to learn. So it's great. I absolutely love that.

[24:41] Scott Schmidt: No idea is a bad idea. That's about it. throw it on the table, see what works. You know, it's teamwork, collaborate, enjoy it's great, it's a great job.

[24:51] Frank Montana: And even just again, seeing where the rest of the country is going from my volunteer aspect, I see even the volunteer world where they're starting to get drone teams. There's two in my county and they're doing a great job there and this is a department that is, these are guys who are coming out of their own bed, paying for their 107 out of their own pocket, doing it because they love it. They want to see the same thing that's happening in any paid department now happen in that more rural aspect. And I believe for the United States, almost 70% of the United States is all funded and taken care of by volunteer fire departments.

[25:26] Scott Schmidt: I have a question for you. So what's your takeaway after meeting all the departments and you see departments from all over the country and stuff. So what's your takeaway? You see, do you notice the collaboration, the teamwork?

[25:36] Kevin Sofen: You're putting me on the spot?

[25:37] Scott Schmidt: I put you on the spot. Question you.

[25:39] Kevin Sofen: I mean, a few things that I've taken from here-

[25:44] Scott Schmidt: Is this your first year here?

[25:45] Kevin Sofen: This is my first time at the Texas Robotics show, yeah. But I think some of the things, these commonalities, common themes that we've heard is the dynamic of how drones save time in terms of, and I heard that same analogy talking to, I think his name is Peter Decker's from FLIR, but he was like, you know, I know it's all infrared cameras, it's all time, you know, being able to quickly understand the hotspots on the fire more quickly so I can make a decision faster. The same with drones. What drones, you know, one great example I heard with NYFD is the DroneSense integration of taking a drone stream and then being able to put that into a tablet onto the ladder fire to be able to more effectively put the wet stuff on the red stuff. I was like, that is so simple. But I think as a whole, I think just in general, I love public safety. Working with working for you guys are really what fires me up and gets me out of bed. And I think just the brotherhood, the sisterhood is amazing, but there's something a little bit extra special about the robotics community that there's just like, there's no competition, there's no me versus you. There's just like, hey, I wanna help you and shared wins. And I think I've seen that across all the podcasts. And probably one other thing I'm personally excited about is TAC. I think I've heard a few people talking about that and whereas that can be used and especially tools like that can be used by the small, medium departments that don't have as many resources. So those are my takeaways so far. And then the hot takes, I think my sort of mic drop and you kind of talked about is just a curiosity. Just stay curious and you never know what you might find by having that next conversation, listening to the next podcast, reading that next book, perusing that next article. I mean, you can't stop learning and having a curious mindset is a great strategy for success.

[27:27] Scott Schmidt: You know, as a kid, what we were talking about earlier when we were setting up our station, MacGyver was a big show as a kid. So just be able to improvise on the spot. Not everything is available. You have to be creative at every moment.

[27:38] Frank Montana: Yes, like a big thing is being innovative and being able to think outside the box is I think why I love the fire services. That's the job. The job is to how do we fix this? How do we get this person to have a bad spot? How do we make this better? And you got to do it on the fly. And again, like little things like if we have to create something and the department supports us, we don't have the part. We can't find it. we have 3D printers, we could just build it. And that is awesome that we have that capability. Something as simple as that, you know, we all learned like, oh, that's cool. Like we can 3D print Legos and things for fun. Now it's like, no, we're doing this for life safety and parts for our missions.

[28:16] Kevin Sofen: Yeah, not taking no as an answer. Yeah. No, actually I think we can figure this out.

[28:19] Frank Montana: Yeah, we can figure it out. You know, it's like you just light a bunch of nerves, almost like I feel like we're working at NASA, but more for the fire service.

[28:27] Scott Schmidt: I was going to equate it like, we're the scientists with Apollo 13. Maybe that's a stretch.

[28:34] Kevin Sofen: More or less. Great.

[28:36] Frank Montana: Same, but different. Yeah. So yeah, it's absolutely great. And you know, I can't wait to see where this is going to be in five, 10 years. And where are we going to be at? You know, are we going to be, you know, more drones, bigger drones, bigger payloads, you know, what ground robots are there going to be, what waterborne robots are going to be. It's limitless. And just to think of everyone is thinking, everyone in this community is always thinking, they're looking for the next best idea. or looking to make everyone's job easier, which is great. Like, no one's trying to hide anything, no one's trying to be an adversary, everyone wants to be on that same page, everyone wants to be on that next level together, because we're as a community, as a robotics community, we're moving upward.

[29:14] Kevin Sofen: Yeah, right now, well, you guys are on the cutting edge, I really appreciate what you're doing, and just keep up the good work. I look forward to following along and continue to support however I can.

[29:22] Frank Montana: Thank you for having us, it was a great time.

[29:24] Kevin Sofen: Yeah. Thank you very much. Thank you, guys. Thanks for tuning in to this miniseries created at the Texas Robotics Summit, hosted by Granite Defense. Make sure to put this amazing event on your calendar for 2025. For this podcast episode, what do you like? What do you think? Drop us a comment on social media and let us know your favorite quote. Thanks for all that you do. Have a great day ahead.