UAV

Integrated ADS-B Technology to Improve Drone Safety

Kongsberg Geospatial has announced that with uAvionix, the two companies will be integrating Kongsberg Geospatial’s IRIS UAS Airspace Situational Awareness Display with uAvionix’s PingStation ADS-B receiver. Automatic Dependent Surveillance – Broadcast, or ADS-B transceivers help track the exact position of aircraft or drones in real time. uAvionix has created tiny, lightweight, and inexpensive ADS-B transceivers that can easily be installed in small UAVs, and the PingStation – a rugged, portable ground-based receiver that tracks the position of ADS-B-equipped aircraft within a range of up to 150 miles.

Kongsberg Geospatial has been providing real-time geospatial and spatial awareness technology to support air traffic management, air defense applications, and unmanned systems for nearly three decades. https://www.kongsberggeospatial.com

Insect-inspired fiberglass drone can survive almost any crash

Researchers at the Swiss National Centre of Competence in Research (NCCR) and the Floreano Lab at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Lausanne (EPFL) have developed a new, crash resilient quadcopter, designed to withstand collisions. The drone is made of a central case and a thin fibreglass external frame with four arms held together by four magnetic joints. As this fibreglass frame is only 0.3mm thick, it is soft and flexible, making it able to withstand collisions without permanent deformation. The four magnetic joints connect the frame to the central case and rigidly hold the frame in place during flight.

Stefano Mintchev, the lead researcher on the project, developed a quadcopter utilising the dual stiffness properties seen in insect wings. Insect wings are composed of sections made of cuticle, a stiff material that takes the load bearing portion of the wing, connected with flexible joints made of the protein resilin that have evolved to be shock absorbent and compliant. www.epfl.ch

Measures to protect Canadians from reckless drone use

Canadians expect to feel safe on the ground and in the sky. The number of incidents involving recreational drones has more than tripled since 2014, prompting the Honourable Marc Garneau, Minister of Transport to introduce a measure to prevent the reckless use of drones that is putting the safety of Canadians at risk. The minister recently announced measures which will affect the operations of model aircraft and recreational drones of more than 250 g and up to 35 kg.

The key new rules are that recreational drone operators must mark their drone with their contact information, and may not fly:

• higher than 90 metres; at night; within 75 metres of buildings, vehicles or people; or within 9 kilometres of the centre of any airport, heliport, aerodrome or water aerodrome where aircraft take off and land.

Operators of drones for commercial, academic or research purposes are not affected by this measure. www.canada.ca/drone-safety

Philippines to use drone to regulate mining industry

The Government of Philippines is being urged to use and invest in drone technology in regulating the highlyscrutinized mining industry. Students from the University of the Philippines (UP) are now pushing for the use of drone technology that will make auditing mining firms cheaper, faster, and more accessible. Recent issues surrounding the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) and its recent closure of major mining firms throughout the country have sparked public outcry.

“Monitoring and auditing mining firms using traditional tools is an expensive procedure done over weeks and months, but with the use of drones, we can perform the process in mere days. This can help in making sure mining firms follow regulations,” said UP student Luis Sia. To develop the technology, Sia started AltitudeX, a 100-percent Filipino-owned technology startup in late 2015, to provide fast, reliable, and costeffective services using innovations in Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) or drone technology. http://business.mb.com.ph

PrecisionPoint hires sUAS Pilot to enhance 3D Reality Capture Services

PrecisionPoint Inc., a national provider of 3D reality capture laser scanning and SCAN-to-BIM Modeling solutions, has announced the hiring of Will Hirschfeld, an experienced Unmanned Aerial System (sUAS) pilot. Hirschfeld will assist PrecisionPoint as it enhances existing 3D documentation capabilities and expands into new services areas using sUAS technology, including Construction Monitoring, Precision Agriculture Inspection Monitoring, Infrastructure, and Forensics. https://www.suasnews.com

senseFly partners with MicaSense for End-to-End Drone & Data Solution

senseFly has signed a commercial agreement with agricultural data gathering, processing and analytics provider, MicaSense, that enables senseFly and its distribution partners to offer MicaSense’s Atlas cloud processing platform alongside eBee drones. MicaSense Atlas is a cloudbased data processing and analytics platform. It generates specialized crop health outputs such as NDVI, NDRE, RGB and chlorophyll maps, providing quantitative information at the click of a mouse that can be used to properly interpret and understand the condition of a crop. www.precisionfarmingdealer.com

DJI’s new range of drones minimise crash risk with other aircrafts

Drone manufacturer, DJI, unveiled its latest M200 series drone models with plane avoidance technology. It uses ADS-B (automatic dependent surveillance broadcast) receivers, which detect broadcasts from nearby manned aircrafts; including, planes and helicopters. ADS-B, which stands for Automatic Dependent Surveillance–Broadcast, is becoming a standard way for aircraft to share their own location and communicate with other nearby aircraft. It’s more accurate than radar, and lets aircraft automatically do their own air traffic control. The new technology will allow drone users to see the position, altitude and velocity of nearby manned aircrafts. The drone user can then take necessary action if required. DJI says it’s been hearing for some time that more industrial users need a more industrial drone.

Emissions mapping through drone-mounted sensors

Innovative Finnish cleantech startup Aeromon has developed a unique platform for rapidly mapping over 70 different industrial emissions. By deploying sensors in static, hand-held and dronemounted configurations, Aeromon uses its cloud-based service to fluidly analyse emissions patterns in any industrial setting – including those that previously proved difficult to access. This enables Aeromon clients to save more time and resources than ever before when managing the environmental effects of their operations, and to protect members of the public from potential unforeseen hazards.

Aeromon successfully conducted pilots at the Ä mmä ssuo waste treatment centre (operated by the Helsinki Region Environmental Services Authority HSY, Finland) in 2015, and in oil and gas industry sites in 2016. The pilots demonstrated the potential to make significant efficiency and financial savings in process industry monitoring applications. aeromon.fi

Rakuten and AirMap announce Joint Venture

Rakuten, Inc., and AirMap have announced the launch of a joint venture, Rakuten AirMap, Inc. The joint venture will provide Unmanned Traffic Management (UTM) solutions to drone operators and airspace managers in Japan. The partnership follows Rakuten’s participation in AirMap’s recent Series B investment round in February 2017. https:// soraraku.rakuten.co.jp/airmap/en/