On a hill overlooking Millerton Lake in Fresno County a group of workers are gathering around a cell tower. They’re watching a tiny white drone slowly circle the tower from the ground all the way to the top. Quasie Jones is with the drone imaging company Skycatch . “So what it’s doing is taking a picture every two seconds,” Jones says. “So by the end of it it’ll basically have probably like five or 600 photos. So then our technology renders that and creates a 3D model.” After the model of the tower is created the drone can then make decisions on its own on on whether there’s anything wrong. It does this by comparing previous photos and video of the tower with what’s recorded today. If there’s anything off then it notifies AT&T. It’s a dangerous job that can take hours if done by a person . Art Pregler with AT&T’s Drone Program says his team’s fed thousands of photos and video into an algorithm to teach the drone what to look for. “A technician will just get a trouble-ticket
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