'Eye in the sky': Centralia police talk drones at city hall

In June 2024, Centralia police, with aid from multiple local and state agencies, captured a suspect who had stolen a kayak and tried to escape down the Chehalis River.

The chase included an airplane, a police K9, and even inflatable rafts used by officers.

On Thursday, April 16, Centralia Police Department Commander David Clary highlighted another element used in the search: drones.

“He's riding (the kayak) down the hill, and I was able to capture it with this drone,” Clary said, referring to the department’s DJI Matrice 30T drone, displayed on the table in front of him.

Clary said he was then able to report to the various teams where the suspect was going and whether or not he had a weapon in his hands.

“All of those things, because we had our ‘eye in the sky,’ as it were,” Clary said. “So this has proved absolutely invaluable.”

The comments were part of a meeting held at Centralia City Hall to discuss the department’s use of drones, the remote-controlled aircraft increasingly being used in investigations.

About 20 local residents attended the meeting, including Dale Hylton, general manager of Blue Skies Drones in Centralia, the company that sold the Matrice 30T to the police department.

Clary said the department began using the Matrice 30T about three years ago.

“It has several cameras on it, wide, zoom, infrared,” Clary said. “And we'll use any one of those cameras, depending on what the mission is.”

He described a hypothetical nighttime DUI crash where a suspect attempts to run away. A K9 and his handler respond, but they don’t have a backup officer.

“You can deploy this quickly, turn on infrared, and see what's happening,” Clary said. “You can see where your officer is. By the same token, you can see where the dog is.”

He mentioned one real-life instance where police had temporarily lost sight of their K9 during the search of a suspect. The suspect choked the dog to unconsciousness, Clary said.

Drones can also see things a human might not be able to, depending on the situation.

“If you have a team of officers that are going to be serving a warrant on a house, where there's a wanted subject inside, it's nighttime, you can't see which door he’s coming out … You have this in the sky overhead with infrared turned on, and you see a little red guy jumping out a window out the other side, you can get on the radio, tell the team where he is, they can be prepared to deal with the issue,” Clary said.

The drones have also been deployed on missing persons cases, the commander said, and can be used to document, for example, an outdoor homicide scene.

The department’s smaller DJI Avata 2 drone, on the other hand, is especially useful for flying indoors, like during the execution of a search warrant.

In situations where a subject is armed and dangerous, drones help keep officers — and their targets — safe.

“Prior to something like this, you'd enter the house on a tactical situation with your skin, and maybe a helmet, and a gun and your vest, so that you could get eyes on inside of the house, inside of the building, to do a building clear,” Clary said.

The commander said the department bought the Avata 2 on Amazon around three months ago, the entire package costing about $1,500.

Because drones are federally regulated aircraft, officers must obtain their Part 107 license, known as their remote pilot certificate.

Clary said six or seven Centralia officers are currently licensed to fly the drones. Though he acknowledged natural privacy concerns, the commander assured the meeting’s attendees that the aircraft are used within the confines of the law.

Drones can typically operate in open airspace below 400 feet, so long as they don’t fly directly over people or moving vehicles.

“If you are using the technology of this drone to see into an area that you wouldn't normally be able to see into with your naked eye, even from, like, say, 3 or 400 feet, that could be a violation absent exigent circumstances, or a warrant,” Clary said.

The department has also used drones during large gatherings, such as the local No Kings protests held over the past year. Not to see who’s protesting, but to protect those in attendance.

“We're watching areas of concern where someone could be in a position of advantage to maybe, you know, rain some terror down on the people down there,” Clary said.

In addition to the two drones owned by the department, Officer Drew Johnson has also purchased his own drone, a DJI Matrice 4T. It’s a newer version of the Matrice 30T.

Johnson said he recently used his drone to locate a suspect who had crashed his vehicle before fleeing on foot and hiding in a field “in the middle of nowhere.”

Clary estimated the department’s drones are deployed about three times a week.

“I believe that as the program expands, they're going to be deployed even more often,” Clary said. “I'd love to see one on every shift.”

He added that the department doesn’t yet have the money for that capability.

While the smaller Avata 2’s all-in costs are relatively inexpensive, the DJI Matrice 30T cost about $18,000 for the entire package, which includes batteries, chargers, and the remote.

That may sound like a lot, but as one attendee put it, the cost of maintenance is almost zero.

The nearby Chehalis Police Department is in the process of acquiring its own fleet. Police Chief Randy Kaut, who attended the meeting with Deputy Chief Matt McKnight, said he hopes to have drones within the next few months.

The training will take longer, Kaut said.

A vocal proponent of the aircraft, Clary called the drones a “force multiplier.”

“There are very few instances on any kind of an active situation where you wouldn't want to use this,” Clary said.

215 N. Pearl St. Centralia, WA 98531 360-736-3311