U.S. Senator Roy Blunt made a visit to Southeast Missouri State University this afternoon. He wanted to see the growth Southeast’s unmanned aircraft systems program has made over the past two years.
When he and Southeast Pres. Dr. Carlos Vargas were talking about initial plans with the program in 2017, he was chairing the U.S. Senate’s aviation subcommittee, and thought there was a market here for people to be trained on autonomous aircraft.
Blunt says in the past, the tasks a drone can now complete were either impossible, or would’ve been done at a much higher cost than what they would today, and it’s “clearly a wave of the future.”
“Aviation generally would be a great door to open at a university today, because so many pilots are retiring, there's a huge shortage in pilots, technicians, mechanics, and lots of other things, '' said Blunt.
Following a tour of the Polytechnic building, Blunt joined several Southeast students and faculty in flying a few drones across a portion of the campus.