Underwater robots and sonar tech help Grand Prairie crews speed searches amid drownings

Three people have drowned and four others have been rescued this year at Joe Pool Lake. Now Grand Prairie’s police and fire departments are using advanced technology to find victims faster.

The Grand Prairie Police Department is one of two agencies in Texas using a special robot for search and rescue.

“The Houston Police Department is the only other department that has the ROV. Ours is a search-and-rescue bot. It has a camera, it has sonar, and it has a claw,” Sgt. Calvin Brown said.

Brown said the technology helps them find people in the water in an average of three hours.

“It really decreases our dive time, so when we do find a potential target, we send the ROV down first, to confirm or disprove what we’re seeing,” Brown said.

Grand Prairie is one of only a few municipalities in Texas where both police and fire have dive teams working together.

Fire Capt. Kevin Baker said the department is one of two agencies in North Texas with an ARC towfish system.

“It’s a tow fish system that has four different sonars on it that uses different frequencies and different angles to be able to map together and stitch together imagery underwater for us to translate to try to locate different objects,” Baker said.

The technology has helped locate vehicles, weapons used in crimes, and drowning victims.

“We’ve been able to find loved ones for people so they can get closure,” Baker said.

It also keeps divers safe while they search in low visibility.

“It gives the diver lay out on any potential hazards underwater and basically gives us a layout of any obstacles and potential entanglements,” Brown said.

The team works throughout North Texas.

“We’ve gone as far as Bridgeport and then as far as Jacksonville in the north end of Texas,” Baker said.