In April, CBC News highlghted the efforts of North Shore Rescue, one of Canada’s busiest volunteer SAR teams. Reporter Georgie Smyth spoke with drone team lead Grant Baldwin about their innovative use of drones equipped with thermal cameras and computer vision. She also interviewed Peter O’Connor, CEO of Eagle Eyes, about how the system is helping enhance drone-based search and rescue efforts.
In the rugged terrain of Vancouver’s Coast Mountains, where dense forests and steep ravines lie just beyond the city’s edge, a single misstep can turn a routine hike into a life-threatening ordeal. Picture a hiker, disoriented beneath a cloudy, storm-covered sky, battered by rain, snow, and howling winds, seeking shelter under a gnarled cedar tree beside a fast-moving river. As temperatures drop and nightfall sets in, visibility fades and hypothermia begins to creep in. When conditions turn this dire, every second counts.
Grant Baldwin, North Shore Rescue’s drone team leader, described a mission where his team was racing against fading daylight and limited drone battery life while searching for a missing hiker. The area was full of treacherous cliffs, thick vegetation, and fast-moving rivers, extremely hazardous and difficult for ground crews to access.
Deploying the drone during that mission described by Grant proved pivotal. Its thermal camera surveyed the hard to access terrain, identifying a faint heat signature amid the cold surroundings. It’s about speed, getting the information from the drone to the map quickly and efficiently so the ground team can respond and act and on the aerial intel from the drone immediately. That evening, the drone pinpointed a faint thermal signature: the hiker, huddled under a tree near the river. The ground team was dispatched promptly, locating the individual, cold and wet, but alive. Without this technology, the outcome might have been tragic, shifting from rescue to recovery.
Drones equipped with thermal cameras and computer vision tools like Eagle Eyes help enable SAR teams to cover hazardous or expansive areas efficiently. They enhance the ability to locate individuals in distress, potentially making the difference between life and death. Using Eagle Eyes software, these drones can now relay real-time GPS data and drone imagery from the drone directly to the team’s CalTopo map.
Read the full CBC article “AI and thermal drones are helping find the lost in B.C.’s mountains”
29 June 2025, by Patrick Robinson