A3
THE ASTORIAN • SATURDAY, JUNE 11, 2022
Drone testing hub buzzing in Pendleton
BY KRISTIAN
FODEN-VENCIL
Oregon Public Broadcasting
Ten years ago, Eastern Ore-
gon Regional Airport was an
albatross: an expensive relic
left over from World War II.
“It was a pretty sleepy little
regional airport, to be honest,”
Pendleton Mayor John Turner
said.
Back then, the airport only
had 20 employees, and there
wasn’t enough economic
activity to justify a regular
fl ight to Portland.
But the Pendleton airport
did have two massive runways
that date back to World War
II and carry a storied history.
This is where the so-called
Doolittle Raiders — the pilots
who fi rst bombed Tokyo, tak-
ing off from the deck of the air-
craft carrier USS Hornet in the
middle of the Pacifi c Ocean —
trained for that mission.
In 2012, Pendleton hired a
new economic development
director, Steve Chrisman, and
one of his top priorities was
fi guring out a better use for
the airport. On his fi rst tour, he
met Oregon National Guard
Lt. Col. Alan Gronewald, who
was overseeing a drone test.
Chrisman said the offi cer
had a simple message for him:
“He said, ‘Listen I don’t want
to tell you your job Mr. Eco-
nomic development guy, but
this world is coming fast.’”
Gronewald was talking
about drones. So in partnership
with the University of Alas-
ka-Fairbanks, the city applied
to become a federally-ap-
proved drone test range. It was
a long shot; Oregon had neither
a long history of working with
drones nor as much money as
others states. But in 2013 the
Pendleton Unmanned Aircraft
System Range was granted
federal permission.
The concept of a fed-
eral commercial drone test-
ing range was relatively new,
so initially, Pendleton offi cials
weren’t entirely sure how to
proceed. Gradually, city lead-
ers collected enough state and
city money to build new hang-
ers so visiting drone compa-
nies could test and tweak their
vehicles in private.
Then, using an Oregon
Innovation Council grant, the
airport bought laser cutters, 3D
printers and high-tech lathes,
so companies could remake
broken drone parts on-site and
quickly resume testing.
The airport bought sev-
eral mobile air-command cen-
ters too, so companies could
drive out into the countryside
to fl y their drones over var-
ied terrains, like canyons, for-
ests, pastures and rivers. Most
recently, with the help of a $3
million federal grant, the air-
port built a 100-acre indus-
trial park with lightning-fast
internet.
The result of all this work
and spending: Pendleton has
become one of the most popu-
lar of the federal government’s
seven drone testing sites, with
up to 1,000 take-off s or land-
ings every month.
Growth in popularity
Retired U.S. Air Force Col.
Stan Springer runs the Vola-
tus Group, a drone pilot train-
ing facility in Pendleton. He
Kristian Foden-Vencil/Oregon Public Broadcasting
Pendleton economic development director Steve Chrisman conducts a tour of the lab at the drone test facility. It has 3D printers
and computer-guided lathes that companies can use to make drone parts.
said there are several reasons
Pendleton has become popu-
lar. High on the list: Cost.
“They have a natural dis-
tinct advantage with their low-
cost base,” he said, noting that
the price of doing business in
Eastern Oregon is cheaper
than in parts of the country that
already have a booming tech
scene, such as Texas.
Also, Eastern Oregon skies
are not as busy as those around
some other test ranges.
“They have a great big
range that nobody else can
duplicate,” Springer said.
Pendleton off ers 14,000
square miles of sky, and the
altitude limit doesn’t kick in
until 15,000 square feet. That’s
a big slice of northeastern Ore-
gon skies, higher than Mount
Rainier. The range runs from
Boardman in the west to the
Idaho border in the east and
from the Columbia River in
the north almost to John Day
in the south.
“By negotiating with area
wheat farmers and other land-
owners, we can spread opera-
tions out away from conges-
tion, which provides some
level of safety,” explained
Cory Roeseler, with Hood
Technology, which special-
izes in blade vibration and
monitoring.
Airport economic develop-
ment director Chrisman says
there’s another reason Pendle-
ton is popular. The city’s man-
tra, “Let ‘er Buck,” fi ts well
with fast-paced, high-tech
businesses that don’t want to
be tied down with red tape.
“So many of these test sites
are operated by government
entities, universities. Folks that
maybe are more interested in
printing research papers than
they are in understanding what
the customer wants,” Chris-
man said.
What customers want,
according to Chrisman, is
to get to market quickly and
safely. And Pendleton helps
them do that.
Over the last six years,
the airport has hosted dozens
of major tech organizations,
including Airbus, Yamaha,
NASA and Verizon.
Nine companies now lease
space year-round; Yamaha is
testing unmanned helicopters
about the size of a small per-
son. They can deliver herbi-
cides directly onto an indi-
vidual vine on a hillside.
Company leaders think the
drones might be more effi cient
and cheaper than traditional
crop-dusting planes.
An Arizona-based com-
pany, Spright, is working on
transporting medical tests
between a health clinic and a
laboratory via drones.
“Our goal is not to come,
test and leave. It’s actually to
come, test and hire and encour-
age jobs locally,” said Spright
vice president, Justin Steinke.
About 10% of drone activ-
ity at the Pendleton Unmanned
Aircraft System Range is mili-
tary. Those projects are secret.
Chrisman said what’s import-
ant is that all these technolo-
gies are cutting-edge and the
basis of what he calls a fourth
industrial revolution.
“The world and Ore-
gon would be very shocked
if they knew the technology
that’s right on the horizon.
And we’re going to hopefully
usher it in, right here through
the Pendleton airport,” Chris-
man said.
dation for visiting drone pilots.
One drone company booked
the local Pendleton House Bed
and Breakfast for two years
solid.
Some of Pendleton’s con-
struction companies have
benefi ted. Joseph Hull, a vice
president at McCormack Con-
struction, said they have hired
several dozen workers to build
hangers over the last couple of
years.
Pendleton’s car rental busi-
nesses are benefi ting and local
restaurants like the Oregon
Grain Growers Distillery have
seen a substantial increase
in diners. Not one Pendleton
restaurant closed during the
pandemic.
But the owner of Eden’s
Kitchen, Kayla Henshaw, said
while she’s seen a few extra
customers, the bigger deal
for her has been all the weird
things in the sky.
She lives out by the airport:
“I like to do motion lapses,
time-lapses out my porch, of
the sunset. And there’s this one
that me and my husband to
this day can’t fi gure out,” Hen-
shaw said. “It looks almost like
a spaceship or something.”
Boon for local economy
All the new activity at the
drone range has been good for
the local economy. Employ-
ment around the airport has
jumped from 20 jobs to 200
over the last six years.
But the new workers are
not doing traditional airport
work like air traffi c control,
and the airport doesn’t off er
any more commercial fl ights
than before the drone boom.
Instead, the new workers are
drone pilots, engineers, entre-
preneurs and software experts,
all working for private compa-
nies on drone projects.
Those businesses are pay-
ing to lease hangers and to use
the drone range, money that
funnels back to local coff ers.
Airport revenues will amount
to about $1.7 million dollars
this fi nancial year; that’s four-
and-a-half times more than in
2016.
After years of operating in
the red, the airport now makes
a profi t.
Drone activity is being
felt in town too. A brand new
Radisson Hotel opens this
spring, to provide accommo-
Potential for drone
manufacturing
While restaurants, hotels
and car rental shops are
reporting increased economic
activity, Oregon Employment
Department economist Dal-
las Fridley said a major drone
impact cannot yet be detected
in the local job numbers. It’s
one thing to test drones in
Pendleton; the real question is
whether Eastern Oregon can
someday attract businesses
that make drones.
“It’s not a situation where
you have manufacturers who
are based in Umatilla County
testing products,” Fridley
said.
Over the last 20 years,
Umatilla County has had a
remarkably stable economy
with a level of 28,000 non-
farm jobs. But that stability
masks turmoil. For example,
hundreds lost work when the
Umatilla Chemical Weapons
Depot closed. At around that
same time, hundreds of oth-
ers found work, as the nearby
Wildhorse Resort and Casino
expanded.
Twenty years of stability
may be comfortable, but it’s
not growth. Pendleton leaders
would very much like to grow
by attracting drone manufac-
turers. Fridley thinks the air-
port is on the right path.
“They are setting them-
selves up for the future by
doing this, because we’re
looking at the fi rst phase of
development in drone tech-
nology and who knows what
it’s going to be like in 10
years,” Fridley said.
Turner thinks that given
time, some drone compa-
nies will start manufacturing
locally. He points out that to
start with, they only came to
the airport for a week. Then
they started to stay for a few
months. Now many have
a permanent presence and
some are starting to bring-in
parts to assemble.
“We think the next logical
step would be manufacturing
of some kind,” Turner said.
He thinks manufactur-
ing in Pendleton makes sense
because costs are lower than
in places like Silicon Val-
ley. The city has invested in
the kind of infrastructure —
state-of-the-art hangers, high-
tech lathes, 3D printers and
fast internet connectivity —
necessary for more.
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