In our view April 24: Spies in the Skies

Here's the minimalist view: It started in 1994 as a nice little company making remote-control airplanes in the Columbia River Gorge town of Bingen. Meteorologists loved using the mini-aircraft.

Here's reality: Insitu, Inc. of Bingen is a cutting-edge company with about 400 workers at a dozen sites up and down the Gorge who design and manufacture unmanned aircraft systems used for scientific research and to bolster the world's most powerful military.

And this is exactly the kind of economic development that should be supported — even encouraged by government-sanctioned tax breaks and other benefits — in the Pacific Northwest. Make no mistake: Insitu workers do not make buggy whips or widgets. Their products face no threat of obsolescence. At Insitu, new aircraft are constantly being designed, tested and manufactured. That's the main reason the company is so valuable to this region's economic future.

But there are other reasons to applaud the company, and we'll start with a recent news flash. During the dramatic, heroic rescue of Maersk Alabama ship Capt. Richard Phillips from Somali pirates, the U.S. Navy used a ScanEagle unmanned aircraft made by Insitu. According to a Baltimore Sun story, Cmdr. Stephen Murphy of the USS Bainbridge told writer David Wood that the ship uses the ScanEagle "extensively, every day. It makes it harder for pirates to hide, and allows us to react much quicker."

The ScanEagle is a pilotless, 40-pound, 10-foot-wide aircraft that needs no runway and can be launched from a ship. Ten years ago, a ScanEagle flew across the Atlantic Ocean in 27 hours. When more than one of the video-equipped craft are used, nonstop clandestine surveillance can be maintained indefinitely.

Thus, Pacific Northwesterners can feel patriotic about Insitu's contributions to the U.S. military.

And here's a recent news flash from the business wire: Insitu on Wednesday announced it had secured a $30 million contract with the Canadian government to provide aerial drones for intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance operations in Afghanistan.

That impressive announcement follows a July 2008 revelation that Insitu had been acquired for $400 million and would become a wholly-owned subsidiary of Boeing Co. Clearly, this is not just some mom-and-pop enterprise making remote-control airplanes in the Gorge.

Insitu's rise to prominence could not come at a more critical time, when many communities in the Gorge struggle to overcome the economic crisis. The company has major operations in the Bingen and White Salmon area, with offices also in Vancouver, 65 miles to the west, and flight-testing activity conducted at Boardman, Ore., 100 miles to the east.

"We look at Insitu as a wonderful, wonderful neighbor," White Salmon Mayor David Poucher said in a 2008 Columbian column by Tom Koenninger. "They are a friendly company to work with, and they're involved in community events."

It's also one of the most progressive workplaces in the Northwest. The company actively promotes off-hour recreation and even encourages workers to bring their dogs to work one day a week.

Unique as Insitu obviously is, many other companies in the Northwest also offer high-wage jobs based on cutting-edge technology. Instead of withdrawing into some cocoon and trying to merely survive this great recession, these companies aggressively position themselves for accelerated prosperity when the economy improves. And at that uncertain time in the murky future, the Pacific Northwest's economy will be drastically redefined, by both the negative forces of the recession and the positive forces of profit-driven visionaries.