Episode 224: Flying Forward: Training & Best Practices for Public Safety Aviation with David Danielson

Episode notes

What's the value of drone programs?

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:

Standardizing drone training in public safety

The importance of collaboration and measurable impacts

Cultural shifts and unifying efforts in drone adoption

Hear from David Danielson - an Adjunct Associate Research Scientist with PREP at NIST and the Head of IEDO Fire and Rescue Drone Commission.

David talks about the development of the Los Angeles Fire Department (LAFD) drone program and the importance of standardized training and proficiency in the public safety drone industry.

He emphasizes the need for collaboration between entrepreneurs and public safety organizations and the value of reporting quantifiable metrics to demonstrate the impact of drone programs.

David also highlights the role of cultural understanding and the importance of unifying voices in the industry. Overall, he emphasizes the power of technology, such as drones, in improving safety and efficiency in public safety.

So click play now to hear what he has 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

1. 0:00 Kevin's intro: the Texas Robotics Summit mini-series
2. 0:45 David Danielson joins: NIST PREP and all the acronyms
3. 1:09 From the Navy and the LAFD drone program to NIST
4. 4:19 Standardized flight training and certification
5. 6:52 Measurable, repeatable sets and reps
6. 9:34 What a concept of operations means
7. 13:14 Tangible outcomes of a responsible drone program
8. 14:59 Reporting quantifiable metrics
9. 16:21 Advice for entrepreneurs: don't go alone
10. 19:37 The NIST checklist process for end users
11. 22:22 Why standards matter
12. 25:44 Training the human, not just the hardware
13. 30:24 Cultural silos and how to overcome them
14. 33:45 Parting thought: don't be in a silo
15. 35:09 Unifying voices and closing thanks
16. 35:57 Outro

Questions answered in this episode

What is NIST PREP and what does David Danielson do there?

PREP is the Professional Research Experience Program through NIST, the National Institute of Standards and Technology. David Danielson is an Adjunct Associate Research Scientist working to bring robotics theory and academics down to end users like firefighters and police officers in a validated, practical way.

Hear it at 1:09

Why did Los Angeles Fire Department develop a standardized drone training method?

David Danielson says FAA part 107 is only a written knowledge test with no proficiency requirement. He and his team drew on Navy standardization practices and worked with NIST to develop a measurable, repeatable method tailored to firefighters, filling the gap where proficiency was not required by regulation.

Hear it at 4:24

What economic impact can drones have on fire departments?

David Danielson says drones reduce firefighter injuries on the fire line, which directly reduces workers' compensation costs over time. He adds that law enforcement programs using drones efficiently also see reductions in use of force incidents.

Hear it at 10:01

What does David Danielson recommend to entrepreneurs developing public safety technology?

He says don't go alone. Partner with the public safety community, be open to feedback, and read existing standards like NFPA 2400 for drones. Public safety agencies are natural risk mitigators and will act as your research and development team if you are open to their input.

Hear it at 17:20

How did crew resource management reduce mishap rates in military aviation?

David Danielson explains that in the 1970s and 80s, Navy mishap rates were high because pilots had ego and rejected input from crew. When the military adopted crew resource management, training everyone to communicate with standard terminology and recognize problems together, mishap rates plummeted and saved taxpayer money.

Hear it at 28:42

Transcript

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

Ep 224 transcript

Flying Forward: Training & Best Practices for Public Safety Aviation with David Danielson

Speakers: Kevin Sofen, David Danielson

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. Here we are rolling into podcast number 17, sitting alongside David Danielson, who is the ARS, the Adjunct Associate Research Scientist with PREP, professional research experience program through NIST, National Institute of Standards and Technology. So ARS, PREP, NIST, lots of acronyms here. David, what's going on, explain that.

[1:09] David Danielson: Yeah, so unfortunately that's actually, my guys have given me that call sign, acronym. So it's hilarious because when you think about it, and this is, here we are at Texas Public Safety Robotic Summit, and just as you've been showcasing amazingly, is just the variety of people, the different cultures, the different languages, right, that we have. And so, as you said, my background there, we all come from different worlds. And in my case, whether you're military, public safety, what have you, we all put on a hat and then you're in service. When you see another open door, you move on. So, I retired from Los Angeles Fire Department after 22 years. It was a short career there, but I had 26 years in the Navy as a helicopter crew chief, you know, basically trained up in standardized flight practices and all that. So the short summary of that is with Los Angeles Fire Department, I was one of two leads for the program. My cohort, Derek Ward, which a lot of folks here, they've worked with Derek for many years. He and I started developing with our chief, Rich Fields, developing the LAFD, Los Angeles Fire Department drone program. Well, a lot like most of us that started in the beginning was our leadership said hey Dave who trained you because there was nothing out there right we had part 107 coming on in 2016 part 107 was a written exam as we all know there's no proficiency requirement in that so we drew upon subject matter expertise which essentially going back to your first acronym there prep you know people hat that had professional experience and align ourselves with those that are working on this problem, the solution, to fill the gap when proficiency is not a requirement. Now, you know, all due respect to the FAA, part 107 is a knowledge-based test only. There's no proficiency requirement as written in, say, a part 61 crewed aircraft licensure. So, you know, how do you fill that Long story short, I started looking around, connected with who at that time was a captain with Los Angeles Fire Department, Tom Haas. He's part of our NIST prep program as well. He had been working on the ground robotics piece after 9-11, where he was working with our director, Adam Jacob. He's the project lead for NIST robotics capabilities. So what that is, big science Disneyland out in Gaithersburg, Maryland, with various other groups like you've already met, the NIST folks from Colorado working on cybersecurity and different aspects of robotics. Adam brought us all together to say, hey, how do we get this theory, these academics and robotics down to the end user, the firefighter, the police officer, to be able to actually show it's validated. It works, right? So my statement earlier about my background on Navy standardization practices, that's what I showed my chiefs. Here's my NATOPS acronym, Naval Aviation Training Operations Procedure Standardization.

[4:22] Kevin Sofen: Say that five times fast.

[4:24] David Danielson: Yes, but I mean that's a historical process for Navy as it is in all branches of the military I would argue, into crewed airspace civilian, that you have a certified flight instruction process, whether it's pilot or crewman. And from this, we're going to tailor to what is happening in the drone ecosphere, and it's specifically firefighters. Looking around for any type of training that is measurable and repeatable, objective, there was nothing out there, except for what was coming from NIST had developed a robotics method for different levels of proficiency, for which today, after five years of doing this, we've got it to the point where programs throughout the nation, and I would say internationally now, have adopted because it is a logical way to go. And it has so much flexibility that commonly, and I'll close this statement with a lot of times people walk up to us and say, what is the objective? And I would ask them, if you understand the method, I would ask you, what is your objective? Let's use the method to achieve that goal.

[5:37] Kevin Sofen: I mean, I think sometimes it's unfortunately the other way around, but I think it's smart to sort of reverse engineer, what do you want to happen? Right. And I think I enjoyed you hearing that, I heard you say that phrase a few times, is certified flight instruction process that is measurable and repeatable. and I think that was something by a talk with Mike O'Shea from FAA, a talk with Koy Kessler from DroneSense, you know, who was leading this IAFF, IFC working group. Part of this has to do with the fact that a lot of this stuff, I mean, drones really didn't exist for the most part on a widespread level 15 years ago, especially in the public safety space. And then now all of a sudden it's becoming commonplace and then you have these part 107 tests and you can just take a test. Really, you can just remember a bunch of questions and answers. I know people who just remembered, took the practice test enough times to pass a test and that you can fly a drone. Does that really make you 100% capable? And so I think that's where I would love to hear you kind of riff more on that in terms of this evolution to public safety aviation and looking at what we're doing with unmanned and unmanned air drones that are used for public safety and how it's sort of evolving into the same conversation as when you go through TSA and the FAA frameworks of actually flying in the commercial airplane.

[6:52] David Danielson: Right. So I would say here's a good illustration is, Los Angeles Fire Department, large department, lot of resource, right? We have our own air operations program. And what our pilots do and the crew do at that air operations is absolutely in line. Obviously they have to be certified. They have to have certain levels of training, absolutely in line with everything that is required within the national airspace, right? So when we first started developing our drone program, absolutely was imperative for us to have relationship with our own air operations and how they train and what they do. But you can imagine, right? Every culture has its own way of doing things. And even within our own organization, pilots are pilots. You drone guys, you're not doing it the way we're doing it. So how do we bridge that, right? It's important that the firefighter, the law enforcement officer, anybody in public safety, arguably any drone pilot out there, own what we are doing, which is you're coming into the national airspace, you need to own what is existing in safe practices when it comes to operational risk mitigation, when it comes to the concepts of crew resource management, aeronautical decision-making, those are all part one of seven tests questions, right? but where are you training to grow and work out your understanding of those somewhat subjective concepts? So it's through what we have here with our NIST process. There are five levels of NIST, level one through three is what we call the open lane. It's where we shake a lot of that out from the very beginner, taking the plastic off the box kind of thing to learn your equipment to that public safety level. we're working it to develop tactics for the incident. It's through that process that is measurable, repeatable in a crawl walk run that you can get organizations up and running provided they own it and they ask the right questions or you have your instructor cadre pushing them in that direction to own what is culturally appropriate for aviation. You're developing airmanship. That's what that is. But what we find is there's a moment where the light bulb comes on and you realize as a firefighter, as a police officer, it is no different than any of our other disciplines of how a firefighter throws a hose line, or I'm sorry, throws a ladder, pulls a hose line, how an officer works in the shoot house and how they get their weapons quals. It's measurable, repeatable sets and reps.

[9:34] Kevin Sofen: I love that and one thing that you mentioned in conversation there as well as Coit mentioned it I've heard a few others and because I'm not a hundred percent familiar with it I'd love for you to explain the air words concept of operations for the layman term 101 what is that in regards to NIST in regards to NIST in regards to robotics concept of operations I'm I'm kind of curious, what does that mean?

[10:01] David Danielson: So the way I look at that is to say, we are using technology to more efficiently get ourselves into the incident safely and perform that mission and return home, right? So when we're looking at, and I'm gonna be specific on the drone piece of this, the moment we strapped a thermal camera onto a drone, and every one of us did it back in the day where we had zip ties and duct tape, right, on a Phantom 3, Phantom 4, whatever. And yes, Mike O'Shea's gleaming at me right now, or the rest of the FAA cadre, but we were part of that R&D, which I would argue today, we're still an R&D group of people. The beauty of it, though, is with law enforcement and police officers' public safety, you are natural risk mitigators. So as we take on this technology and we use it to get into the incident more efficiently and get our firefighters or police officers performing to mission objective, that's our goal. So a good simple case example is, you've had several experts here talking about wildland firefighting. One of the first operations, the first official operation for Los Angeles Fire Department, both Derek Ward and myself working on the Skirball incident. This was back in 2017, during the major wildland fire incidents going on in California. We had the 405 freeway completely engulfed in flame on both sides of the freeway. You had multimillion dollar homes at stake, the Getty Center major museum at stake, and Derek and I are working on, back in the day, a Matrice 100. That was that open sourced drone that had no canopy on it, avionics all exposed, but it had an HT camera, a thermal camera, right? So first official flight, FAA acknowledged, we have a TFR set up, and there's a whole backstory on that one, as well as understanding airspace and what's the proper procedure to get your drones into a TFR. We learned a lot that day, but at the end of the day, we're using that drone to get right on top of a hotspot. Instead of firefighters cold trailing everything, we're getting them to the hotspot, cold trailing that, moving to next objective. That is an efficiency, right? But think on the back end of that, how many firefighters are injured on the fire line? Drones equate directly to a reduction of work compensation. It has an economic impact over time if we're looking at the data, that those that are efficiently using a standardized approach are using drones in a way that have a lifelong impact. On the LE side, I would say, look at your use of force impact. If you have drones that are, or you have a drone program that is efficient and working towards solving those problems, those active programs, if you look at the data, how many incidents have a reduction of use of force? Those are huge data points that need to be discussed and the value of that technology.

[13:14] Kevin Sofen: I love how you just phrase those two things, which is oftentimes people think, oh, it's just a flying piece of plastic. You know, a certain way it is, but I think when you translate it to, actually, no, it's not. It is this piece of plastic in the right program directly reduces workers' comp long-term. It directly reduces use of force. And now they say long-term, short-term, immediate term to long-term. And I think those are kind of the great sort of statements that those are the tangible outcomes that you get by effectively utilizing and implementing

[13:46] David Danielson: drone program responsibly. Right and what really where we're at in the evolution right now is now that we've in my view we've taken this turn organizationally nationwide and I argue worldwide that drone pilots are being more accepted the science and the technology behind it has advanced beyond that phantom 3 with duct tape right it's now become where we have industrialized drones, enterprise drones that are designed for our purpose. What we, and I believe quite, Kessler touched on this during his discussion with you. We need organizations like IAFF that are seeing the value of that drone and from a labor standpoint, that we're protecting our firefighters. This is a firefighter safety tool. This is a law enforcement safety tool. But the long-term impact is for those organizations, whether it's IAFF, the National Tactical Officers Association, IAFC, the Fire Chiefs Association, or the IACP, the International Association of Chief of Police. Remember acronym.

[14:56] Kevin Sofen: Yeah. No. Hey, Mr. Acronym, man, you were a kid and I love it.

[14:59] David Danielson: So those organizations now owning it and pushing the reporting, you know, bringing the direction back down to say, hey, we need your drones to start collecting this information. Over time, your programs documenting the reductions of injury, the reductions of use of force and whatever other metric you are wanting to quantify. Because for them, especially at that leadership level, they're reporting back to, you know, their local governments, whether it's the city, the county, the township, whatever, and they're having to push their budgets. I know this is not really a popular subject, but it's an immediate impact. If I can't get my drone program up because there is no line item or budget there, then we need that support to get there. So how do you get there? You start reporting upon those quantifiable metrics because 30 years down the line, you're looking at work comp. You're looking at the cost to the city, the cost to the community of supporting that firefighter, supporting that law enforcement officer who served, who now cannot. It's a metric thing, but it's also an emotional one, right? We want the IFF, or we have the IFF, and the US fire administrator behind us because we know down the line, this is a cost impact to our society. That's why this technology needs to move forward.

[16:21] Kevin Sofen: I love it, man. I couldn't agree more, and I appreciate you continuing to lead the charge here. One of the big stakeholders within this community are entrepreneurs. There are technologists. They are different stage, early, mid-stage, established companies that are already within public safety. Maybe they're in fire, law, and EMS, or even companies outside of public safety as a whole. And my question for you is, what would be your message to entrepreneurs that are in companies that are trying to develop technologies, whether it's robotics or wearables or software, companies that are looking to have the best intentions and want to move the needle with helping first responders make better decisions and help make first responders safer and reduce workers' comp, reduce injuries, reduce use of force, all the things we want to reduce and all things we want to increase. There's a world of opportunities out there. What would be some of your tips and tricks, ideas, suggestions that you would say to them?

[17:20] David Danielson: So first and foremost is don't go alone, right? Reality is we're moving forward in this technology and you may have the next big thing. Absolutely, but you need to go into partnership with especially the community you are trying to affect. So in the public safety space, recognize you have a whole community of organizations out there now that are open and willing to be your R&D, right? They're already natural risk mitigators, whether it's law, fire, what have you. Be open to that, be open to understand that there are, even though it may not be publicized a standards forum, there are standards out there that have developed culturally. So as example, again, I'll point to NIST is that even though we have yet to have say ASTM International to publicize, they're working on it, they have the committees, you do have documentation like NFPA, National Fire Protective Agency's guidelines. NFPA 2400 is public safety use of drones. Even though you're not in the public safety space, read that, look at that, be knowledgeable of what's already there, you don't have to reinvent the wheel. Reach out to whoever is using this technology as it stands right now and be open to the feedback. The biggest challenge we have right now in the overall drone ecosphere, and I would argue robotics as a whole, is you have many different silos. You have manufacturers that are trying to put out the next best thing. You have the end users that are struggling because we're having to fill voids or gaps where there was not a progressive certified flight instruction process. You have leadership that is coming after 30 years of being in a leadership role that, oh my gosh, I got to take on something new. Do I risk? And all of that is good to understand how we put it into context, how we discuss together that we're all in the same game. I need to have a relationship with a manufacturer that understands the methods I am using to be able to develop their equipment, develop their next best thing to meet my objective. They need me to test it out and our leadership needs to have confidence.

[19:37] Kevin Sofen: And I think you've alluded to it a few times, but you have this piece of paper here with a lot of NIST initiatives, but it's a one, two, three, four, five, looks like checklist type process. What is this?

[19:49] David Danielson: So our biggest challenge with NIST, of course, and this is the discussion of end user, i.e. operator, working with the, I'll quote, Dr. Raymond Shea, he's the one that said propeller head.

[20:03] Kevin Sofen: That was me. The man, the myth, the legend.

[20:06] David Danielson: Right. But the truth is, right, academia, the lab coat, the PhD out there, they're all coming up working on these concepts. And before I get into this, I wanted to just give a quick historical plug. Most people don't know what NIST is, National Institute of Standards and Technology, as you put out. They don't know what it is, where it is, and how it came to be. NIST is a part of the Department of Commerce, federal. It's a major part of our government, you know, institutionalization of learning and programs to help our public. So back in the day, around the turn of the century, last century, 1900s, NIST was what was called NSB, the National Standards Bureau. And I'll point to one historical reference why NIST came to be. The 19, oh, don't quote me on this, yes, I got it, 1904 Baltimore Fire. That's a historical reference, you can go to the NIST website, it's in their archives. There is a direct correlation that goes back that many years where our government was trying to do the right thing. National Standards Bureau assessed the damage that occurred during the Baltimore Fire, looking at how buildings were made and the types of materials we used. And they came up initially with the first building codes that are in today's culture of modern building. I would say on the fire side that's where the national standard thread for hose couplings going on to hydrants happen. Because what happened there was Baltimore was burning down over two days a massive amount of commerce lost and buildings lost and all of these firefighters trying to do the right thing, but the type of hose that they had and the thread diameter they had didn't fit into the infrastructure of Baltimore, therefore it burned down. So NSB came around and they reviewed all that documentation, wrote up the report that went up our, you know, up our federal lines of leadership and established standards. And yeah, there's a historical connection there of this federal entity affecting us directly on the things that we do every day.

[22:22] Kevin Sofen: One thing I kind of was coming to mind there was the idea of standards, and standards kind of sound like rules, and sometimes rules sound kind of lame, and you're like, I don't want to fall by these, and I sometimes live my life of, you know, easier to ask for forgiveness and permission. Not always the case, sometimes the case, but standards sometimes I feel like maybe get a little bit of a bad rap, and I'd love to know your thoughts on kind of like how standards actually are, on the flip side, really driving innovation and really pushing the industry forward.

[22:54] David Danielson: Right, so when everything works, right, when you have the manufacturers following a standard, so let's look at crewed aircraft. Crewed aircraft, not only do you have pilots that are trained in a certified flight instruction process, they also understand the airworthiness certification process and most of us in the drone world are like, what is that? All we know is it's a part 107 question that says, you shall fly an aircraft that you confirm is airworthy. Now that's a slippery slope because in crude aircraft space, if you're flying in a helicopter or a fixed wing aircraft or whatever, they have to have an airworthiness certification process that gets annually reviewed and your maintenance program is following those standards so that we mitigate the potential of broken equipment, mishap, lives lost, right? So I'll give you a quick example, and for all my Navy guys out there, forgive me, but just a quick summarization of why standards works from just a training standpoint to when we actually go operational in combat. If I have crews that are trained in how to perform in that aircraft and recognize when things start changing, when the mechanics of that aircraft are starting to fail, then that air crew, that crew resource management of a pilot and crew all trained on the same standards, they communicate quicker, right? They have standards of language where there's no confusion in what they're seeing. So if I'm the crew chief in the back of the helicopter and I recognize, hey, we're getting a lot of heavy vibration that is not the norm because we've been trained on standards to recognize these things, we go into critical memory items, we go into actions, reactions that are expected. It is predictable behavior, right? So as we take on these new technologies, if we are not implementing that same mindset, that same airmanship, then are we delayed to react when that drone doesn't do what it's supposed to do? How many times have you heard that, hey, I just crashed the drone and something's wrong with the drone? Frequently. But did you address the other factors involved? So what you're talking about, or what I'm talking about there is equipment factor, right? If it was truly equipment failure, we can deduce that out. But have you addressed human factor? How are you trained? How consistent are you training? What are you training on? The equipment factor is understanding the limitations of that aircraft. The aircraft is designed to perform a certain way when it comes from the manufacturer. But do you know what those limitations are? What test method are you using to shake that out periodically? And finally is environmental factor. How are you flying it? Where are you flying it and what conditions? If you are not standardized in how you approach that, man, that's a lot of work.

[25:41] Kevin Sofen: Yep, and you're setting yourself up for failure.

[25:43] David Danielson: Exactly that.

[25:44] Kevin Sofen: And I remember, and you'll probably have more elaborate context on this, but I would love to hear, I remember hearing when they were talking about training of Navy pilots or training of some of the most advanced aircraft and the most advanced pilots for the DOD where we could spend millions, billions, trillions on the newest aviation, the Osprey program, for example, the effort and time and to perfect that and all the different things we can do from the propellers to the paint to the style, the wing, to all these things and millions and billions of dollars of research. But then they kind of take a step back and then it's like, well, what about, yes, we can understand maybe the limitations and we could spend another trillion dollars to make it move a little bit faster and would be a little more sleeker, but let's also look at the human factors element. Let's look at the operator of it and really thinking about what level of improved efficiency gains can we get from training the said human, which by, you know, it's still 2024. Humans are still pretty, still ruling this world. Robots aren't controlling us just quite yet. But the aspect of the human training within this of, you know, yes, the hardware and all the tech is going to keep advancing. But the importance of the efficiency gains that we can get by continuing to make the human operators, you know, some are beginners, some are intermediaries, some advance, some, you know, we don't wanna say you're ever a perfect, maybe you could be the best in your crew, but everyone can always get better. I'm sort of ranting here, but what are your thoughts on me?

[27:12] David Danielson: No, you're right on target. Because whether it's fire, law, in the disciplines that they do, whether you're an elite special operations forces individual, whether you're a helicopter pilot, civilian, or military, the reality is you're always gonna fall back your basics when you're under stress. That's what we have to train to. You have to have repetition going back to the basics because once stress inhibits you're no longer thinking at tip of the spear. You're no longer thinking at that higher functioning level. You're going back to what you know. When it comes to the NIST piece of this, that's exactly what we're showing you. We're showing you a method to have that conversation and work out those mindsets. I'm going to bring back in part 107. There's an awesome question about flight behaviors, right? It's the psychology definitions. One of them it's probably dated, but it's machoism, right? The mindset of machoism. It's that pilot who went through all this training that now he's qualified and certified in XYZ aircraft like you brought up this just high tech, awesome performance aircraft. Back in the 70s and 80s with the Navy and across the branches as the military, we saw our mishap rates. Because the mindset then was, I'm the hack, I'm the helicopter aircraft commander, I've trained to this level, I have ego, right? Hey kid, shut up, you're a meat in the seat.

[28:40] Kevin Sofen: Ego is the enemy.

[28:42] David Danielson: Ego is the enemy, right? And then, you know, Navy flight physiology and all the behaviorists came around and they gave, you know, directive to NAVAIR is the body of people that say, this is how you will fly within safe regimes. And they said, look, you guys need to start adopting a concept called crew resource management, CRM. And during that time, of course, you saw a cultural battle, right? All these right stuff pilots that have gone through the regiment and they are insanely capable of doing what they do. They have to go through a cultural change and start adopting the eyes and ears of other people to help them determine their aeronautical decision making. So now we went through this cultural shift and man, it was rough. But as soon as CRM programs and the generational learning started happening, our mishap rates plummeted. The cost and savings to the American taxpayer was dramatic, right? So it is a factor for which it's like, look, be open to new concepts. The reality is if I'm trained to be an eyes and ears supporting my pilot as a crewman, so I would argue also for the drone pilot, your VO, your visual observer, needs to be trained just like you. He needs to understand what you're doing. It's a challenge and reply. When I say I'm lifting, he says, you're lifting. And if I start drifting left or right, he or she is gonna pop out and say, you're drifting left, you're drifting right. You've got common terminology, standardization, right? So it was a huge deal when it came to that behavioral acknowledgement and then building systems that address that problem.

[30:24] Kevin Sofen: I really appreciate you bringing up the word culture and that kind of intertwined with behavior. Cultural silos and the challenges and the behavioral challenge, you know, and we could spend a whole another hour talking about that, but if I was gonna ask you to riff on that for a minute or two, cultural challenges and how do we overcome them, what are your thoughts?

[30:44] David Danielson: So for me, you know, for, again, we've highlighted two different lives that I've lived, right, the Navy side and then fire department side. And it was very interesting because, you know, After having my experience in the military and all that, I have a bias. And that's a main point right there, is acknowledging where you came from. And when you're coming into something new, acknowledge the culture you're going into and finding that bridge, finding that way where we're all, you know, we all want to leave it better than we found it, right? Acknowledge your biases from the culture you came from and come into the new culture to be that solution in a way that's contextually fitting for that culture, right? But it also, by doing that, it also flips the script where the culture you are now in, you're helping them be open to adopting new things. So in public safety, it's really no secret, whether you're law, whether you're fire, whatever agency name you have, you have your biases that are cultural specific to your organization. You have a language that is specific to your organization. Our challenge is now look outside, be open to what's coming, because especially with this technology, it's exponential, right?

[31:59] Kevin Sofen: I need to connect you with a gentleman named Dr. Burton Clark, and he wrote a book. It's the same book, but he changed the title. The first title was, I Can't Save You, But I'll Die Trying the American Fire Culture. He then changed it to, a couple years later, to I Can't Save You and Don't Want to Die Trying American Fire Culture, and he talks a lot about the fire service culture dynamics, some of the wonderful things, some of the different challenges with it talks a lot about the seat belts, wearing seat belts, and how all this stuff is great. Drones are great, all this stuff is great, but if you can't even put your damn seat belt on, what kind of safety message does that send from top to bottom?

[32:35] David Danielson: Yeah, so, I mean, man, what's the acronym? KISS? KISS, yeah. It's simple stupid, right? And you look at today's firefighting and today's law enforcement. Back in the day when you've got, you know, who is your captain, your lieutenant, or your chief today. They've got 20, 30 years in front of you where they were mentored and they learned from those that came before them. And they're now moving into technologies and realities that you are adept to, but they're not, but they're leading you, right? We gotta keep it simple. But we need to do it in a way that is pushing us forward to getting their acceptance, leadership's acceptance, say, hey, yeah, right. This is something as simple as putting on the seatbelt. And now we can move them forward to say, hey, hold on, cause we're gonna start bringing on some exponential technologies that is that seatbelt, right? That's what the seatbelt looks like today. Having a tool that has FLIR or has LIDAR or whatever, what does that mean? It's Greek to them, but it's that seatbelt for today's firefighter safety or today's law enforcement safety.

[33:45] Kevin Sofen: Well said. And again, I think we could vibe on this for another hour. And actually, I take pride in that you've officially surpassed the longest podcast at the Texas Robotic Summit.

[33:54] David Danielson: Dang! I'm sorry, people.

[33:57] Kevin Sofen: He's like, keep it short. But if I could maybe ask you, I've been asking everyone this sort of a final mic drop moment, and then it can be related to this or something else. If you had a kind of a quote that you live by or a question, a challenge, a comment that you could leave us with here today, what would that be?

[34:14] David Danielson: Yeah, everybody says this one's tough. The problem is in our service, law, fire, military, whatever, when you own being operational, you own that we are there to help and we're going to do everything possible. Own the fact that we have new tools, right? But be that mindset that is looking at the problem, coming up with a solution, and you are aware of its limitations, be a part of the conversation that is discussing those things in a way that, you know, you're not falling prey, no disrespect to the manufacturers, but marketing. We are critically thinking the capability in creating relationship with everybody that touches the space. Don't be in a silo.

[35:03] Kevin Sofen: Mic drop. There's probably an acronym for that. David. It's been a pleasure, man. Thank you for your time.

[35:10] David Danielson: You're very welcome. Man, this is the first time we met, and I heard a lot, you know, quite the rest of the crew that's out there. You're doing awesome. I've listened on the side with all the variety and the way you are hitting on points that lives for them and then explaining, that's awesome. And so like what we talked, or what you've said several times and that keeps coming out in the podcast here is unification of voice. Man, that's a great thing.

[35:38] Kevin Sofen: Yeah, well, kudos also to Dr. Lori Moore for pioneering that from the USFA and really moving towards one voice. So one voice here, one voice there, one voice everywhere. I really appreciate you saying all that, David, and look forward to staying in touch and continue to collaborate on the exciting initiatives that you have in the works. Awesome.

[35:55] David Danielson: Thanks. Thank you.

[35:57] Kevin Sofen: Thanks for tuning into this mini series 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'd you like? What'd you think? Drop us a comment on social media and let us know your favorite quote. Thanks for all that you do and have a great day ahead.