“We can see areas that the naked eye that’s on ground level would not necessarily be able to see right off hand,” communications manager Mike Emory said. “While the police may be at one area, or beach patrol at one area, the drone can be up in the sky, identify something in another area and help the beach patrol or even water rescue teams get to where they need to be.”

In addition to keeping beach-goers safe, Oak Island is also attempting to use the program to keep people off the renourished dunes. To that end, the drone is able to fly over to anyone who is walking on the dunes and talk to them through a speaker on the front.

Drone pilot Shawn Barry says that’s usually enough to get people to move back onto the outlined paths.

“We utilize the drone to keep an eye on the dunes,” Barry said. “If there happens to be anyone in the areas they’re not supposed to be, outside of the posted rope crossings. We’ll keep the drone and patrol those areas with the drone.”

Barry feels the drone program will continue to bring a number of benefits to Oak Island.

“It’s definitely a money-saver,” Barry adds. “It enhances our preparedness as well as any mitigation that we have for any future type of storms or events that could affect us in our community. So it’s definitely a game changer, and in a positive way.”

Officials say the drone program is one of the first in Brunswick County, but they hope to see other towns follow their lead.

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One of the robots, Flir FirstLook, is designed to crawl through tight spaces that are dangerous or otherwise impossible for humans to reach. At the size of a brick, it can even be thrown into areas that are hard to reach, where they will then use their wheels to search the rubble. If the robot lands upside down, it has the capability to right itself.

FirstLook robots weigh approximately 2.2 kg and are built to withstand drops of approximately 5 meters, even when dropped on hard surfaces such as concrete. The robots feature thermal sensors, cameras, and two-way radios in order to relay information back to search and rescue operatives.

A different robot, called PackBot 510, has a servo-arm that can move loads weighing around 40 pounds (18 kg). It weighs 50 pounds (22.6 kg) and can be stored in a car trunk and deployed within two minutes.

PackBot 510 is intended to be used to dispose of bombs, perform surveillance and reconnaissance, and handle chemical, biological, radiological, and nuclear agents and other hazardous materials.

Both PackBot and FirstLook are semi-autonomous robots, which means they need an operator present during their search.

Also both have been tested following the devastating collapse of a condo in Miami, Florida on June 24, 2021.

“In a collapse situation like this, the pile is structurally unsound and constantly vulnerable to shifting. It’s much safer to have a robot crawl deeper into a void than to have a person crawling into that void,” Tom Frost, Teledyne Flir’s vice president of unmanned ground systems, told The Washington Post at the time.

Teledyne Flir was formed after aerospace electronics firm Teledyne Technologies acquired Flir, a 42-year-old software company for $8 billion. The merged companies develop technologies predominantly for the military, space exploration, and for the deep sea.

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As of April 2021, there are 26 new S-Poles in 6 areas of Seoul — including Seoul Plaza, Sungnyemun Gate, Cheonggyecheon Stream and more. Each S-Pole has customized functions reflecting the characteristics of the area. They also enhance urban scenery and improve the safety, welfare, and convenience of citizens.

The SMG aims to expand areas of S-Pole installations and pursue a pilot project to advance their functions at the end of 2021. Specifically, they want to add new capabilities to these S-Poles and use them for charging drones and electric vehicles and detecting parking violations — bringing Seoul one step closer to becoming a smart city.

The idea is to install stations on top to charge drones, while also using S-Poles to send data used for monitoring disasters and rescue operations. A function of monitoring illegal idling and parking will be added as well.

The S-Poles were born to replace several traditional city technologies such as the aforementioned traffic lights or streetlights, which could have many more features. The installation of S-Poles will lead to the amelioration of urban scenery through the integration of diverse facilities, saving the replacement cost by using the street facilities that have reached changing times, and securing the safety of the facilities.

The project also reflects a growing trend for street infrastructure to be multipurpose to minimize visual clutter and use of public space.

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Relying on Parrot’s proven ANAFI drone platform, it comes equipped with a 4K HDR camera with a 21-megapixel Sony sensor, as well as a FLIR radiometric thermal-imaging camera, complete with 160×120 resolution and a temperature range of 14°F to 752°F (-10°C to 400°C). ANAFI Thermal’s gimbal can tilt vertically 90° upward or downward, giving professionals an “unprecedented field of view.” There is also a 3X digital zoom to allow pilots to examine hard-to-access areas without taking unnecessary risks. The drone’s visible and thermal light spectrum cameras are stabilized on three axes, allowing for sharp videos and clear pictures in any flight conditions. ANAFI Thermal is also ultra-compact while its folding design makes it easy to carry around.

The ANAFI Thermal is designed to profoundly revolutionize the way individuals in a wide variety of industries and trades operate, offering professionals a solution that adapts to their required needs. From rescue service providers and experts in civil security to public works professionals, energy providers and environmental preservation organizations, the ANAFI Thermal offers a robust mix of features, performance and software capabilities to meet the growing needs of a wide variety of professionals who can utilize drones to improve their operations and minimize risk.

The Parrot Skycontroller 3 remote control also provides a reliable Wi-Fi connection for over one mile, meaning operators can use the drone while maintaining a safe distance from at-risk or difficult-to-access areas. Images from the visible and invisible light spectrum can be viewed, analyzed and even merged with Parrot’s FreeFlight 6 app.

Additional performance features include:

• A 78-minute cumulative flight time (three batteries lasting 26 minutes each per charge)
• The ability to reach a top speed of 34 mph.
• Capabilities to withstand wind speeds of up to 31 mph, allowing the drone to operate in volatile conditions and environments.
• All-in-one packaging – giving users everything they need to get started right out of the box.

At the time of the announcement, Parrot’s ANAFI Thermal was selling for $1,900. Meaning, the price could be lower these days — yet, you can still get a capable drone that could be used by firefighters, the police force and other city services.

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And so in July 2020, China-based maker of autonomous aerial vehicles (AAV) EHang launched a better alternative for dealing with high-rise building fires in the form of a large-payload intelligent firefighting drone. Based on its flagship product, this new firefighting version of EHang 216, “EHang 216F” is specially designed for high-rise firefighting.

With hundreds of thousands of high-rise buildings in China, the company believes the EHang 216F can become essential equipment for thousands of fire stations across China and eventually those around the world.

The EHang 216F has a maximum flight altitude of 600 meters (0.37 miles), and can carry up to 150 liters (around 40 gallons) of firefighting foams and 6 fire extinguisher bombs in a single trip. The drone uses a visible light zoom camera to quickly identify the location of fire; it then hovers precisely in position and uses a laser aiming device to fire (in succession) a window breaker, the fire extinguishing “bombs” and then a full-range spray of firefighting foam. Multiple 216Fs can be deployed to rapidly extinguish the fire.

“We are pleased to introduce the EHang 216F AAV aerial firefighting solution, which solves difficult challenges in high-rise firefighting,” EHang’s Founder, Chairman and CEO, Huazhi Hu said at the time of the announcement. “The high-rise fire use case highlights the practical application of our passenger-grade AAV platform to different smart city management needs.”

EHang 216Fs are expected to be deployed in urban fire stations to assist in firefighting within a 5km radius (around 3.1 miles). EHang’s autopilot and centralized management technologies enable a fleet of EHang 216Fs to be remotely dispatched for the first response even before the firefighters arrive. This significantly shortens response time and can reduce casualties.

The fully-equipped EHang 216F AAVs combined with the command-and-control system offers comprehensive services including investigation, firefighting, rescue and emergency management.

Accelerating urbanization and building density are increasing fire hazards and creating more difficulties in firefighting. According to a survey by China Fire Magazine, 233,000 fires were reported nationwide in 2019, among which 6,974 cases happened in high-rise buildings with a year-on-year growth of 10.6%.

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Atlanta-based Sonin Hybrid has built a drone exclusively for first responders. Called Recruit, this quadcopter is designed to keep first responders safe in a world of emerging challenges. In that sense, it offers extended flight time and greater capabilities than typical commercial drones.

Using the company’s patent-pending gasoline and battery-powered system, the Recruit can recharge batteries while in flight. The gasoline engine is hooked up to a generator, which in turn continuously charges the batteries for the four electric motors. This combo then enables the drone to stay in the air for over three hours.

Furthermore, the Recruit can reach speeds of over 140mph (225 km/h), which is three times faster than most of the fastest commercial drones available today, according to the company.

And that’s not all, coupled with a lightweight airframe and carbon fiber body – it also offers enhanced payload capabilities.

Other features include a 30X optical/12X digital zoom 4K video camera with fixed and mobile target tracking, Forward-Looking InfraRed (FLiR) camera with night vision, PA speakers, spotlight, and additional sensors for first responder missions.

The Recruit can be controlled remotely in real-time or can autonomously follow a preprogrammed flight path.

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As a result of the drone use, the Linn Police department has been able to reduce the manpower needed to respond in situations by as much as 50%. Specifically, it is using drones for search and rescue operations, especially around the lake in town and to survey road damage. The drones are also being used to provide aerial images of buildings and infrastructure for maintenance and repairs to be completed.

Within the first three or four months of the [drones] purchase, Bushey’s department received a call from a resident who couldn’t find her husband. Evidence suggested the man was in a particular part of the lake. A drone was launched, and after two minutes of flight time, the police found the husband.

During the COVID pandemic, the police used drones to patrol the town without needing manpower on the ground which has allowed social distancing to be better followed and reduce the risk of police officers getting the virus.

“The use of drone technology enables us to not only protect our community better and more efficiently, but we’re also able to help neighboring jurisdictions. We all face similar manpower and equipment challenges, so unmanned aerial capabilities make a huge difference for solving cases,” James Bushey, Chief of the Town of Linn Police Department said at the time. “Combined with the ability to patrol while maintaining social distancing, we’re more confident than ever in our ability to protect our residents.”

The three drones the Linn Police has bought include the DJI Inspire equipped with the DJI XT thermal camera, an older drone but still very capable; the Mavic 2 Enterprise Dual; and the smaller DJI Spark.

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Dubbed the “pandemic drone,” it can be fitted with a specialized sensor and computer vision system that can monitor temperature, heart and respiratory rates to detect people sneezing and coughing in crowds, offices, airports, cruise ships, aged care homes and other places where groups congregate.

“There’s a lot of engineering going on right now but the aspiration is to have this in some sort of initial capability within six months. We had always thought the technology could be used for something like this but we also thought that this was something down the track as a nasty possibility,” UniSA’s Defence Chair of Sensor Systems Professor, Javaan Chahl, said in March 2020. “Now, shockingly, we see a need for its use immediately, to help save lives in the biggest health catastrophe the world has experienced in the past 100 years. It might not detect all cases, but it could be a reliable tool to detect the presence of the disease in a place or in a group of people.”

Professor Chahl and his research team achieved global recognition in 2017 when they demonstrated image-processing algorithms that could extract a human’s heart rate from drone video. Since then they have demonstrated that heart rate and breathing rate can be measured with high accuracy within 5-10 meters of people, using drones and at distances of up to 50 meters with fixed cameras. They have also developed algorithms that can interpret human actions such as sneezing and coughing.

The research has previously looked at using drones to monitor and react to elderly falls, look for signs of life in war zones or following a natural disaster and monitoring the heart rate of babies in neonatal incubators.

The two parties agreed to immediately start integrating commercial, medical and government customers. They added the technology was being adapted and fast-tracked to potentially become a viable screening tool for the COVID-19 pandemic. After that, such drones could prove valuable in big cities’ health toolkits, helping them more effectively manage population health issues.

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We can’t stop or restrict economic activity, but we could catch our waste before tide, wind and currents carry it out to the open ocean. And that’s where RanMarine’s solar-powered aqua drones kick in — to perform autonomous waterway cleanup and data collection.

Called “WasteShark,” it resembles a miniature catamaran with a sieve-like basket under it. The drone measures about 3 feet by 4 feet, weighs about 150 pounds and trolls along the surface of the water scooping up litter, biomass, microplastics and other detritus — powered by a battery that lasts up to 16 hours, depending on conditions. Аll in all, it can “eat” up to 200 liters of trash in one trip — after it is brought back to recycling and waste-management partners for processing.

WasteShark could also be equipped with lidar to avoid collisions from up to 60 meters away, along with up to 15 customizable IoT sensors for measuring factors such as temperature, pH, depth, green algae, hydrocarbons in oil, and more. The drones use GPS waypoints and autonomous software to follow set pathways collecting waste and data — or can be steered manually via remote control.

WasteShark is best suited for harbors, rivers, and canals — so-called “waste chokeholds” that RanMarine has identified based on weather patterns, shipping and wind movements, and the tides. The company has already deployed its drone in the Port of Rotterdam and brought it stateside to the Baltimore Harbor.

RanMarine says the drone doesn’t harm fish, which generally swim away from it as they do with sailboats. Birds also tend to avoid it. Although the WasteShark does not operate in major shipping lanes, it is visible to shipping traffic, per maritime law.

The company does not have plans to take the WasteShark out in the open seas/oceans. Instead, it aims to vacuum up trash at ports and harbors to stop plastic pollution at the source — wiping out floating debris before it drifts down into the oceans.

Obviously, clients for these sorts of drones are city and county governments with smart city tech and some kind of water nearby, along with water districts and special districts that might need to clear out biomass like grass or duckweed from clogging turbines or other equipment.

RanMarine’s drones are offered to cities in three different packages: (1) buy the drones as a capital purchase, and the company will help maintain them; (2) hardware as a service, by which the customer pays an annual fee and RanMarine takes care of everything; or (3) contract with local service providers who will operate the drones.

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