During the response and recovery to Hurricane Ian in Southwest Florida, the use and integration of small Unmanned Aircraft Systems proved a valuable resource to a variety of missions and organizations. Florida has led the nation on sUAS integration into emergency management and disaster response, and in 2023 the state will continue to develop this capability with a full scale sUAS focused exercise held in Tallahassee, Florida.

The Catastrophic UAS Remote Sensing Exercise, called C.U.R.S.E. 2023, will be conducted on June 28th and June 29th, 2023 and is hosted by Florida State University’s Emergency Management and Homeland Security Program, Federal Emergency Management Agency Region IV, the University of Alabama at Huntsville and ASSURE.

The primary location for the exercise is Tallahassee, Florida, but agencies can participate remotely if travel for individuals is not possible. This model was successfully used in 2020 and 2021 and provides teams from all over the state and Region to gain experience in sUAS operations, coordination, and data management. Details on this mode of participation will be forthcoming. Those interested in attending are encouraged to fill out our Exercise Interest Form.

The broad objectives for this exercise are:

• Exercise Federal, State, and Local sUAS teams on disaster response missions, taskings, and data requirements.
• Provide training and experience to sUAS team members, including opportunities for Florida UAS Position Task Book progress.
• Integrate sUAS data collection with geospatial intelligence workflows to support existing missions, such as urban search and rescue, reconnaissance, and damage assessment.
• Engage sUAS team participants and EOC/command post staff with data exchange requirements and processes.
• Develop relationships between sUAS teams and supporting personnel at all levels of government from around the state and region.
• Provide understanding on the realities of sUAS integration into disaster response and recovery missions.
• Demonstrate the data needs for remote sensing products in disaster response and recovery.

All sUAS teams and resources that may participate in disaster response or recovery, to include local missions, State Mutual Assistance, or EMAC are invited and encouraged to participate. Participation is free, though the exercise design team does not have funding to support travel or backfill costs.

The exercise will include a full day of data collection and field operations on Wednesday, June 28 – to include night operations. Thursday, June 29 will be a partial day, with participants released to travel home by early afternoon. The design team anticipates participation from local and state sUAS teams from a variety of agencies, as well as Federal partners from across the federal disaster response enterprise.

Organizations that wish to attend are encouraged to fill out our Exercise Interest Form. Filling out this form will help us keep those interested updated about the details of this event as they are developed. Individuals that require justification to attend can download our Official Letter for their leadership.  If you have any questions about C.U.R.S.E. 2023, please email David Merrick (dmerrick@em.fsu.edu) or Jarrett Broder (jbroder@em.fsu.edu).

[The interest form has been closed: 2023-06-21]

Download the C.U.R.S.E. 2023 Flyer

Download the Florida UAS Position Task Book

This page last updated 2023-06-21.