# Drone Survey

> What a drone survey is, what it can and cannot see, how a flight runs and what it costs. Written plainly by a CAA registered surveyor based in Exeter.

Somebody who has been told they need a drone survey, or has read the phrase somewhere, and wants to understand what one actually is and what it costs before they go anywhere near choosing who does it.

Most people reading this have been told they need one and have no idea what that means. So here is the plain version first. If it turns out you do need one, the price is fixed before anybody turns up.

## Services

- [Building and roof survey](https://drone-survey.co.uk/services/building-and-roof-survey): One building photographed from the air in detail, ridge to gutters, and written up so the condition of the parts nobody can reach is on the record.
- [Land and site survey](https://drone-survey.co.uk/services/land-and-site-survey): A field, a yard, a paddock or a development plot photographed from directly above and stitched into one flat image, so an area can be seen and shared.
- [Thermal survey](https://drone-survey.co.uk/services/thermal-survey): A radiometric thermal camera flown over a building to show where heat is leaving it and where moisture is sitting, which an ordinary camera cannot show.

## Key pages

- [Home](https://drone-survey.co.uk/): What it is, what it shows, what it costs
- [Services](https://drone-survey.co.uk/services): What Drone Survey does and what each job includes.
- [How it works](https://drone-survey.co.uk/how-it-works): How a job runs, from the first call to what arrives afterwards.
- [Areas covered](https://drone-survey.co.uk/areas): 48 towns across Devon and the South West.
- [About](https://drone-survey.co.uk/about): Who runs Drone Survey and how it works.
- [Contact](https://drone-survey.co.uk/contact): How to get in touch and what happens next.

## Other pages

- [Cost](https://drone-survey.co.uk/cost)
- [What is a drone survey](https://drone-survey.co.uk/what-is-a-drone-survey)
- [Where we fly](https://drone-survey.co.uk/where-we-fly)

## Areas covered

- [Exeter, Devon](https://drone-survey.co.uk/areas/exeter): The city where the surveys are based, with a building stock that runs from Georgian terraces to last year's estates, and a river valley that keeps everything damp.
- [Cranbrook, Devon](https://drone-survey.co.uk/areas/cranbrook): Devon's newest town, still building out phase by phase, where the survey questions are about workmanship and warranties rather than about age and wear.
- [Topsham, Devon](https://drone-survey.co.uk/areas/topsham): A listed estuary town where the roofs are old, the salt air never lets up and the streets are far too tight to get a scaffold anywhere useful.
- [Plymouth, Devon](https://drone-survey.co.uk/areas/plymouth): A hilly naval city of flat commercial roofs, surviving Victorian terraces and exposed post-war estates, where the wind comes straight off the Sound.
- [Torquay, Devon](https://drone-survey.co.uk/areas/torquay): Grand Italianate villas and hotels with roofscapes so tall and complicated that most owners have never actually seen the top of their own building.
- [Paignton, Devon](https://drone-survey.co.uk/areas/paignton): Flat ground, Edwardian and inter-war seaside terraces in great number, and a guest house stock full of extensions that nobody has inspected in decades.
- [Brixham, Devon](https://drone-survey.co.uk/areas/brixham): A working fishing port packed into a steep bowl around the harbour, where the wind comes from every quarter and the cottages are painted rather than pointed.
- [Newton Abbot, Devon](https://drone-survey.co.uk/areas/newton-abbot): Railway-era terraces in large numbers on damp low ground by the Teign, plus big industrial spans on the trading estates that nobody can walk on safely.
- [Teignmouth, Devon](https://drone-survey.co.uk/areas/teignmouth): A seafront town that takes easterly gales up the Channel, which catches out buildings detailed only for weather arriving from the other direction.
- [Dawlish, Devon](https://drone-survey.co.uk/areas/dawlish): Cliff-top bungalow estates and a seafront that takes the full weight of a south-easterly, making this one of the hardest-hit roofscapes on the coast.
- [Totnes, Devon](https://drone-survey.co.uk/areas/totnes): A medieval hill town of slate-hung frontages and jettied buildings where the roofs run into each other and the valleys collect everything that falls.
- [Dartmouth, Devon](https://drone-survey.co.uk/areas/dartmouth): A port so steep that streets become stairs, with timber-framed merchant houses whose roofs discharge straight onto the building below them.
- [Kingsbridge, Devon](https://drone-survey.co.uk/areas/kingsbridge): A steep estuary-head town where Fore Street climbs hard from the quay and the tightly packed roofs sit in each other's turbulence.
- [Salcombe, Devon](https://drone-survey.co.uk/areas/salcombe): Contemporary flat roofs, glazing and terraces stacked on a very steep hillside above the water, in one of the most salt-exposed places on this list.
- [Exmouth, Devon](https://drone-survey.co.uk/areas/exmouth): Two miles of open seafront and unbroken salt-laden south-westerlies, which corrode fixings faster than anywhere inland and lift ridges and verges every winter.
- [Budleigh Salterton, Devon](https://drone-survey.co.uk/areas/budleigh-salterton): Substantial detached houses in generous plots, many long-held and lightly altered, which means original roofs quietly reaching the end of their working life.
- [Sidmouth, Devon](https://drone-survey.co.uk/areas/sidmouth): A Regency town in a steep valley where the hills either side gust hard around chimneys, on buildings with some of the most complicated roof geometry in Devon.
- [Seaton, Devon](https://drone-survey.co.uk/areas/seaton): Post-war bungalows on the slopes and Victorian terraces on a front that is only metres from the beach, where shallow pitches shed water badly under wind pressure.
- [Lyme Regis, Dorset](https://drone-survey.co.uk/areas/lyme-regis): Built into an actively moving landslip coast, so the roofs here carry structural distortion on top of the usual salt and wind problems.
- [Bridport, Dorset](https://drone-survey.co.uk/areas/bridport): Unusually wide Georgian streets laid out for rope walks, in a valley that funnels southerly weather up from West Bay onto the higher ground.
- [Weymouth, Dorset](https://drone-survey.co.uk/areas/weymouth): A Georgian esplanade of parapet and hidden gutter construction, where a blocked gutter overflows inward into the building rather than outward onto the promenade.
- [Honiton, Devon](https://drone-survey.co.uk/areas/honiton): A famously uniform Georgian high street rebuilt after fire, sitting in a valley that holds fog and keeps roofs damp right through the winter.
- [Ottery St Mary, Devon](https://drone-survey.co.uk/areas/ottery-st-mary): A compact valley town with a great church, cob and thatch survivals in the lanes, and mist that lets moss establish on anything facing north.
- [Axminster, Devon](https://drone-survey.co.uk/areas/axminster): A hilltop market town open to wind from every quarter, with former carpet and mill buildings carrying large spans of metal and asbestos cement.
- [Cullompton, Devon](https://drone-survey.co.uk/areas/cullompton): A Culm valley town on flat ground beside the M5, holding damp and frost, with medieval fabric, thatch and a lot of late twentieth century estate housing.
- [Tiverton, Devon](https://drone-survey.co.uk/areas/tiverton): A steep-sided town in one of the wettest parts of the Exe valley, where many roofs sit above the general roofline and take more wind because of it.
- [Crediton, Devon](https://drone-survey.co.uk/areas/crediton): A market town in a red sandstone valley surrounded by working farms, where thatch ridges and north-facing slate take the brunt of Atlantic weather.
- [Wellington, Somerset](https://drone-survey.co.uk/areas/wellington): A mill town at the foot of the Blackdown escarpment, where the hill above accelerates south-westerly wind over the higher streets.
- [Taunton, Somerset](https://drone-survey.co.uk/areas/taunton): A large county town on a low vale floor that holds fog and frost, with continuing development on all four sides and a great deal of commercial roofing.
- [Bridgwater, Somerset](https://drone-survey.co.uk/areas/bridgwater): Flat and low beside the Somerset Levels, with wind coming unbroken off the Bristol Channel and ground so wet it matters for access as well as for damp.
- [Chard, Somerset](https://drone-survey.co.uk/areas/chard): The highest town in Somerset, on a ridge over 120 metres up, exposed from every quarter and holding snow and frost longer than the land around it.
- [Yeovil, Somerset](https://drone-survey.co.uk/areas/yeovil): A manufacturing town in hamstone country with very extensive post-war estates and large industrial spans, in one of the drier corners of this coverage.
- [Sherborne, Dorset](https://drone-survey.co.uk/areas/sherborne): An exceptionally consistent hamstone town where the abbey and school buildings carry lead, parapets and valleys that fail slowly and cost a great deal.
- [Dorchester, Dorset](https://drone-survey.co.uk/areas/dorchester): Chalk downland exposure and brick, flint and rendered frontages on a Roman grid, plus Poundbury with an entirely different roof vocabulary next door.
- [Okehampton, Devon](https://drone-survey.co.uk/areas/okehampton): One of the wettest and windiest towns on this list, right at the northern foot of Dartmoor, where roofs simply do not get a chance to dry out.
- [Tavistock, Devon](https://drone-survey.co.uk/areas/tavistock): A planned Victorian town in green Hurdwick stone on the wet western edge of Dartmoor, with tall stone chimneys that take serious wind loading.
- [Ivybridge, Devon](https://drone-survey.co.uk/areas/ivybridge): A late twentieth century commuter town on the southern moor edge, where estates from the 1970s onward have all reached the same maintenance age together.
- [Holsworthy, Devon](https://drone-survey.co.uk/areas/holsworthy): An open plateau town in farming country with nothing between it and the Atlantic, where heavy clay ground keeps plant and scaffold off site all winter.
- [Launceston, Cornwall](https://drone-survey.co.uk/areas/launceston): A hilltop former county town catching weather off two moors, where slate hanging on exposed elevations exists precisely because of the driving rain.
- [Liskeard, Cornwall](https://drone-survey.co.uk/areas/liskeard): A former mining town on high ground between Bodmin Moor and the coast, with substantial Victorian stone buildings and rainfall well above average.
- [Saltash, Cornwall](https://drone-survey.co.uk/areas/saltash): Near-vertical waterside streets under two bridges, where the Tamar funnels wind hard and conventional access on the old town is awkward and costly.
- [Barnstaple, Devon](https://drone-survey.co.uk/areas/barnstaple): North Devon's main town at the tidal limit of the Taw, open to Atlantic weather up the estuary with nothing much in the way of it.
- [Bideford, Devon](https://drone-survey.co.uk/areas/bideford): A steep former shipbuilding port on the Torridge where the terraced streets make scaffold access a serious problem and slate hanging is everywhere.
- [Ilfracombe, Devon](https://drone-survey.co.uk/areas/ilfracombe): Dramatic Victorian hillside terraces with parapets and hidden gutters, on the fully exposed north coast, where water shows inside long before anything shows outside.
- [Great Torrington, Devon](https://drone-survey.co.uk/areas/great-torrington): A hilltop town standing on a bluff above the Torridge, so it takes wind loading from every direction with nothing around it for shelter.
- [South Molton, Devon](https://drone-survey.co.uk/areas/south-molton): A Georgian market town on the southern approach to Exmoor, surrounded by livestock farms whose exposed buildings take sustained wind loading.
- [Bude, Cornwall](https://drone-survey.co.uk/areas/bude): As exposed as anywhere on this list, where Atlantic gales regularly strip ridge tiles and lift shallow-pitch coverings on the cliff-top estates.
- [Minehead, Somerset](https://drone-survey.co.uk/areas/minehead): Sheltered from the south west by North Hill and wide open to the north, with the hill above producing strong downdraughts over the roofs beneath it.

## What is on the record

- CAA registered: Registered with the Civil Aviation Authority as an operator, with both an Operator ID and a Flyer ID held. Anybody flying a camera drone for you should hold both.
- A2 Certificate of Competency: The qualification that covers flying closer to buildings and to people than the basic rules allow. It is not a GVC and this site does not claim one.
- Insured with Coverdrone: Commercial flights are covered by a Coverdrone policy. A copy of the certificate is available on request, and most managing agents will ask for it.
- One named surveyor: Sam Hembury plans and flies every job himself and writes up every report. There is no crew and no subcontractor, so the person you speak to is the person who turns up.
- DJI Mavic 4 Pro: A 100 megapixel Hasselblad camera and 6K video. That resolution is the reason a cracked mortar joint is readable in a photograph taken from twenty metres away.
- DJI Mavic 2 Enterprise Advanced: Carries a 640 by 512 radiometric thermal camera alongside the ordinary one, which is a different job: heat and moisture rather than condition.
- Report within 48 hours: The written report follows the flight within 48 hours. It is a process commitment rather than a promise about what the report will find.
- Construction background: The reports are written by somebody who worked in construction before flying, so a defect is described in the words a builder or a roofer will use back to you.

## Contact

- Phone: 07723 572149
- Email: info@exeterdronesurveys.co.uk
- Enquiry form: https://drone-survey.co.uk/contact
- Based in Exeter, covering Devon and the South West

## Optional

- [Full text version](https://drone-survey.co.uk/llms-full.txt): every service, town and question on this site as markdown.
- [Sitemap](https://drone-survey.co.uk/sitemap.xml)
- [Privacy](https://drone-survey.co.uk/privacy)
- [Terms](https://drone-survey.co.uk/terms)