MTI Precision Ag Students Use Drone Technology

Mitchell Technical Institute students with drone

Mitchell Technical Institute precision agriculture students recently used the program’s new Trimble UX5 drone to survey land and take high resolution images. Photo: MitchellRepublic.com

After weeks of sitting in the classroom, several Mitchell Technical Institute students were able to spend a few hours outside Friday — flying a drone, writes Sara Bertsch on MitchellRepublic.com.

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The drone, which was purchased for $49,995 by MTI in June, was being used by precision agriculture students to survey land, taking high resolution images.

The students took instruction from Devon Russell, the precision agriculture technology department head and instructor. Russell was required to attend training and become certified before flying the Trimble UX5. For five days, and eight hours each day, Russell was learning the ins and outs of the Trimble drone before the institution was allowed to purchase the device.

“It’s the future,” Russell said.

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The students spent several minutes making sure everything was in place, going through a flight check-list and completing all of the steps before the launch.

Once the drone took flight, Russell said it pretty much “flies itself.”

Before launching, the students created a flight plan in class for the area they wanted to survey. The drone downloads the plan, automatically calculates how it needs to fly the area, and does the rest on its own.

Read the full story on MitchellRepublic.com.

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