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Edmonton50 company AIRmarket leads BVLOS drone operations, building McElhanney’s expertise to apply advanced drone capabilities across its engineering, geomatics, and environmental services
A massive transformation is underway in global aviation as drones are becoming critical tools for public safety, infrastructure inspection, emergency response, wildfire management, and industrial operations. Canada alone is forecasting 19 million drone flights annually by 2045, underscoring the scale and urgency of safe, coordinated airspace management. Yet today, Canada lacks the essential infrastructure for drone integration - there is no real-time surveillance, no approved drone connectivity network, no integrated airspace model, and no mandated traffic coordination system.
DFR (Drone-as-First-Responder) combined with RTM (real time monitoring) telemetry (including but not limited to real-time position/altitude/health with live video/thermal and mission logs) is one of the fastest growing, cutting-edge innovations in emergency response. DFR providing speed, and RTM telemetry providing intelligence - together are fundamentally changing emergency response from reactive to informed, proactive, and safer. The convergence of Drone as First Responder (DFR) programs and wildfire monitoring technologies represents a rapidly growing market driven by increasing wildfire frequency, regulatory evolution, and technological advancement.
Flying Beyond Visual Line of Sight (BVLOS) with Remotely Piloted Aircraft Systems (RPAS) is complex and BVLOS missions require detailed planning, including robust communication systems, and, significantly, some form of "Detect-and-Avoid" (DAA) technology to mitigate risks to other aircraft.
In case of wildfire detection and mitigation, the situation is even more complex as the airspace is shared with fire suppression aircraft (manned and unmanned), emergency responders etc. The integration of Remotely Piloted Aircraft Systems (RPAS) and Beyond Visual Line-of-Sight (BVLOS) operations are especially critical in case of wildfire management, along with robust Real-Time Monitoring (RTM) to enhance situational awareness and safety.
“AIRmarket’s leadership … is pivotal to advancing the commercialization of BVLOS RPAS operations within Canadian airspace,” says Stef Kischkel, RPAS Coordinator at McElhanney. “Our collaboration is instrumental in developing systems that not only enable the safe and effective implementation of BVLOS RPAS operations across Canada, but also streamlining the technology, making it more accessible and efficient for users,” he adds.
“By enabling safe drone operations, we support faster emergency response, wildfire detection and monitoring, safer industrial inspections, and precision environmental monitoring - all while reducing risk and enabling high-value missions that would otherwise be impossible,” says, Lindsay Mohr, Chief Executive Officer of AIRmarket. He adds, “AIRmarket is an airspace utility for the drone economy, functioning like Air Traffic Control for drones. Our managed-service platform integrates infrastructure, software, and compliance to enable safe, automated, and scalable drone operations.”
About McElhanney
McElhanney Ltd. is a Canada-based consulting firm that provides engineering, geomatics (surveying and mapping), geospatial, environmental, planning, and landscape architecture services.
About AIRmarket
Edmonton based AIRmarket is building Air Traffic Control for Drones. Their platform is Canada’s first approved RTM (RPAS Traffic Management) airspace utility, and combines infrastructure, software, compliance, and real-time surveillance into a unified platform. AIRmarket has recently delivered Canada’s first DFR (Drone-as-First-Responder) program and first RTM-enabled wildfire airspace program.
About Scale Up Canada
Scale Up Canada is a not-for-profit dedicated to connecting Canadian innovators with industry experts and strategic investors. Our mission is to drive the global commercialization of Canadian-made innovations, ensure investor readiness for high-potential startups, and build capacity for community organizations working with Canadian founders. This project was partially funded through Scale Up Canada’s Expert Advisory + Grants program.