The problem: most spray drift detection occurs as damage complaints long after a preventable event has occurred

Pesticide applicators, a critical link in the production of america's food, are tasked with cheap and efficient application of pesticides to protect our food and fiber. At the same time, they are tasked with stewarding our air, water, and land by making precise applications in an imprecise world filled with variables over which they have little control. IT is a heavy burden and the tools to efficiently prove a responsible application free of drift damage DON't exist. This leads to mistrust, expense, and litigation. Farms struggle to employ spray applicators, at least in part due to this heavy burden and the relatively low reward versus risk. Applicators need to be able to prove they did a good job and kept their spray where IT belongs.over 2.5 million acres of crops were reported to have been damaged by spray drift in 2017 (parker 2017); many more acres, including crops, wildlands, and water courses were likely impacted and not reported. Data on crop losses due to pesticides are difficult to obtain. Many losses are never reported to the state and federal agencies because the parties settle privately. (pimentel ET AL., 1993). (pimentel 2005) revised earlier estimates and put a value on total economic losses due to pesticide over-application on crops, including spray drift, as just under $1.4 billion dollars annually .no doubt pimental's estimation would be low in today's dollars. In addition, with the market introduction three seasons ago of the dicamba herbicide-resistant crop trait and the subsequent broadscale use of that herbicide, drift complaints have accelerated to the point they are a main-stream media topic. Dicamba is active on some plants in as low as parts per billion concentrations in the air (kruger, pers. COM.) and lethal to others in parts per million. (kittay, 2017).we often see drift in abstract, anthropocentric terms, i.e i couldn't see IT, so IT must not have happened. However, IT is impossible to make a spray without at least some small quantity of drifting particles. Good, responsible applications with spray drift below levels that would cause an effect are achievable with careful attention to weather, application speed, droplet size, and spray release height. The ability to detect and quantify spray drift operationally as IT occurs, and before the drift spreads in sufficient quantity, will be a strong mitigation of risk for all involved. With present drift detection methodologies, real time detection is simply not possible, thorough IT is desired by stakeholders. This is an unfilled and costly technology GAP.