May 17 Drones

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They are being used in many fields, from the military, to transportation, to space exploration. Essentially, a drone is a flying robot that can be remotely controlled. Some drones fly autonomously through software-controlled flight plans in their embedded systems, working in conjunction with onboard sensors and GPS. Today we are going to explore how drones are changing our world.

Bad roads are one of the biggest challenges to bring affordable healthcare to rural areas in developing countries, especially during the rainy season when small far away towns might be hard to reach by land. The benefits of introducing drones as additional modes of transport included: increased equity and access to medicines for patients, responsiveness to urgent needs and potential use in emergencies and catastrophes. 

Drones can send visual data during wild forest fires. Drones can also send wind conditions information in real-time from flying up close to fires. This information is vital for rescue and firefighters teams. 

In 2017, Land Rover partnered with the Austrian Red Cross to design a special operations vehicle with a roof-mounted, thermal imaging drone. Thermal imaging can help locate people who are lost or wounded in cold places and even under the snow. 

Shipping packages and cargo in large ships requires an immense amount of expertise and labor from the estimated 1.65 million people serving on international merchant ships today. This is why Rolls-Royce has already completed a number of trials with unmanned vessels controlled remotely.

Drones can help inspect telecommunication equipment. In the aftermath of Hurricane Harvey in 2017, AT&T and Verizon launched drones in Houston, Texas to inspect their towers — a process that would have been too dangerous and time-consuming to do with people. These drones were able to quickly assess damage to help guide repair teams in restoring service. In many cases, service was brought back in hours rather than days.

Many Airforce pilots from the US have been taken out of real air fighter jets and trained to be drone pilots. In a room packed full of U.S. Air Force personnel this past week, SpaceX founder Elon Musk issued a bold pronouncement: “The fighter jet era has passed… locally autonomous drone warfare is where it’s at, where the future will be.” The reaction in the room was immediate — a collective pause.