The Perry Police Department recently purchased some new technology that will better assist them in locating suspects or missing persons.

Police Chief Jim Archer shares that the department bought a Matrice 200 V2 Drone from the Dallas County Sheriff’s Office in August for $3,000. He explains that the Sheriff’s Office originally bought the drone in 2020 for $25,000 and only used it a handful of times, so they wanted to sell it and the Perry Police Department purchased it for $3,000. 

 Archer highlights some benefits about the drone.

“We have an infrared camera. It can be just like a regular video or you switch it to infrared then it picks up heat signatures. So it can be flying at night, and it’ll pick up heat coming off of people, animals, (and) objects that were warmed by the sun. Another thing that it does is that if you were to try to fly the drone into a building or something like that, it has a feature built into it that it won’t allow that to happen. Another cool feature is that if the batteries start to go down, it will automatically sense that, and it will come back and land on its own.”

Archer adds that the drone can reach a height of 400 feet, travel at a maximum speed of 30 miles per hour, and search out for three miles. He confirms that currently one officer is licensed to fly the drone, but seven are in the midst of acquiring theirs through the Federal Aviation Administration. Archer reveals the department is looking to purchase another drone in the future as more officers become licensed.

Archer outlines that the department was granted $5,070 of memorial funds from the family of former Perry Police Sergeant Verle Haglund, who Archer points out is the only member to start and end his career with the Perry Police Department. He indicates that the department needed to buy additional items for the drone, and was awarded with $6,600 from the 100+ People for Perry group this past September.