Savannah River National Laboratory Unmanned Aircraft System Program Receives National US General Services Administration/Interagency Committee for Aviation Policy Award

The 2022 GSA/ICAP Federal Aviation Safety Award follows a recent award presented by the Department of Energy (DOE) Office of Aviation Management to SRNL for the Best UAS Program within the DOE, which the SRNL UAS Program won for the third consecutive year. The award recognizes excellence in management, operations, maintenance, training, safety and best practices.

“This award recognizes the rigor the SRNL UAS team puts into having a robust program and maintaining safe operations,” said SRNL Executive Director of Strategic Initiatives Greg Cefus. “Earning this award for a second consecutive year demonstrates our team’s unwavering commitment to operational excellence. The SRNL UAS program plays a key role in supporting national security missions and other missions across the Savannah River Site – from conducting inspections of waste tanks to photographing progress on construction projects for other site contractors,” said Cefus.

The SRNL UAS team consists of a program manager, operations manager, an aviation safety officer, six FAA Part 107 certified pilots, and a trusted operator program level 2 remote pilot. Another individual serves as ground control support and as a visual observer. The SRNL UAS Program currently has 20 UAS aircraft (rotary and fixed-wing) in its fleet and the team works closely with the DOE-Savannah River Site aviation manager and safety officer to plan and conduct on-site missions under an approved flight readiness review board.

The SRNL UAS Program was created in 2017 and provides support to SRNL, the Savannah River Site and its various tenants, the Armed Forces, U.S. Government, law enforcement, and the intelligence community. The UAS Program also supports emergency response, as necessary, to SRS and the local community. For more information about the SRNL UAS Program, visit https://www.srs.gov/general/srnl/factsheets_2023/UAS_rev102622.pdf.

Savannah River National Laboratory is a multi-program federally funded research and development center that’s managed and operated by Battelle Savannah River Alliance, LLC (BSRA) for the United States Department of Energy’s Office of Environmental Management. SRNL puts science to work to protect the nation by providing practical, cost-effective solutions to the nation’s environmental, nuclear security, nuclear materials management, and energy security challenges (https://srnl.doe.gov/).