I was thrown into the UAV survey world by being handed the ‘keys’ to our $120,000 drone the day my boss went on holiday. What was a very nerve-wracking initial experience has turned into an aerial surveying career spanning over ten years. During that time my experience has extended well beyond aerial surveying to include everything from complex terrain and infrastructure modelling to multispectral capture and analysis, natural disaster recovery monitoring and everything in between.
In 2017 I joined The Surveying Company to start a UAV division, concentrating on introducing aerial mapping and surveying to Hawke’s Bay. Drone It NZ is the next step in this process, increasing the number of drone pilots and expanding our services to cater for the Hawke’s Bay and wider North Island market.
The highlight of my career is having the opportunity to present at the Pix4D User Conference in Denver, Colorado. There, I showcased my work using a UAV to survey 10km of vertical cliff faces (up to 150m high) with restricted accessibility. The data produced from the survey allowed geotechnical engineers and the local council to make informed safety decisions about access along the beach.
Gav trained as a Survey Technician straight out of high school and spent the next 17 years working as a Surveyor in Auckland in every facet of the job.
LT subdivisions, topographical surveys, HIRB checks, building setouts, engineering setout blah blah blah. Then he dropped his tools, made a bee-line for the Bombays and escaped, and just kept going until he ran outta gas at the end of State Highway 5.
Gav has now been in Hawke’s Bay for the last 10 years doing LT subdivisions, topographical surveys, HIRB checks, building setouts, engineering setout blah blah blah. Then Big Willie Stylez came along and introduced him to the long-forgotten dream of aerial mapping. Albeit a little different from what he learnt back in the day with manually drafting on two overlapping images of photos taken from planes.
Things are a little more high tech now, and this old dog is learning some slick new tricks.
