Overview:
As the CEO of Indigenous Aerospace, Jacob Taylor's drive comes from his relentless pursuit to ensure indigenous people benefit from drone technology by providing education, equipment, and training that creates business opportunities and revenue from UAV services within local Indigenous communities.

In this episode, Jacob discusses the many different ways drone technology can improve the quality of life within indigenous communities, which are located throughout the remote and sparsely populated regions of Canada.

This includes supporting nature and land management, mapping traditional territories to document current and historical land use, and solving logistical challenges (including delivery of critical supplies such as food and medicine).

Today’s Guest:
Jacob Taylor of the Curve Lake First Nation - Otter Clan is the CEO of Indigenous Aerospace, a company whose vision is to provide education and support for First Nation people using drone technology in their local territories to improve their local quality of life. As a student at Western University, Jacob studied Aboriginal Health Policy as an undergraduate and continued on to receive his graduate degree in First Nation Policy Leadership. In 2021, Jacob received Western's Faculty of Health Sciences Young Alumni Award.

Jacob is currently a Ph.D. student at the University of North Dakota's Medicine and Health Science division, studying the impact of drones on Indigenous health.

Overview
Johnathan Smeh has had quite the journey throughout his nine years in the commercial drone industry, but drones weren't initially on the radar when he was pursuing a career in geography, GIS, and manned aircraft.

n this interview, Johnathan talks through first discovering the drone industry, its evolving technology, and how it's shaped both his current work and what he hopes to work on in the future (hint: it's out of this world!). He also discusses unique piloting stories from the field that required both creativity and ingenuity to ensure mission success.

Today’s Guest

Johnathan Smeh is a Certified Photogrammetrist and GIS Specialist at Volatus Aerospace and a Certified Photogrammetrist with the Canadian Institute of Geomatics. Since starting in the commercial drone industry in 2013, Johnthan has built and sold two companies, High Eye Aerial Imaging, and Canadian UAV Solution, and has hundreds of flight hours on both Multirotor and Fixed Wing Aircraft. A skilled drone pilot, he is an expert at performing all aspects of UAV service, including pricing, flight planning, data collection, and processing.

Maude Pelletier was a geomorphologist working in the Yukon territories studying permafrost, generating precise high-resolution aerial images using photogrammetry to get elevation models and more. She tells the story of encountering the first lidar payloads for drones, and realizing how it could make a significant impact to her work. This led to founding a company that created new innovations in drone lidar technology.

In this interview, Maude describes elements of lidar technology, compares and contrasts lidar with photogrammetry, discusses strategies for creating point clouds, and explores typical use cases.