During a technology demonstration at the Mid-Atlantic Regional Unmanned Aircraft Systems (MARUAS) Airfield at NASA’s Wallops Flight Facility in coastal Virginia, Virginia Governor Terry McAuliffe operated unmanned systems in three domains—air, land, and sea.
The demonstration showcased how unmanned systems are being used by scientists to study the effects of major storms and sea-level rise on barrier-island dynamics, in an effort to form policies for coastal resilience.
UAS
UAS
FlightWave to announce MAPIR as first partner in its Payload Partner Program
When FlightWave Aerospace Systems, Inc. introduced its premier system, the FlightWave Edge UAS, back in August, the company highlighted its “Payload Partner Program,” which is an initiative to “open-source an integration kit for the Edge’s payload/nosecone.”
With the goal of the program being to give customers their own unique flight experiences and functionalities while using the Edge UAS, FlightWave will announce its first partner in the program, a company named MAPIR, during the Drone World Expo on Wednesday, Oct. 4.
“We picked MAPIR as our very first partner because their company shares our approach to serving the UAS marketplace,” says FlightWave CMO Edmund Cronin.
New Jersey’s Mercer County Community College and ABJ Drones launch UAS pilot certification program
Thanks to a partnership with ABJ Drones, Mercer County Community College (MCCC) in West Windsor Township, New Jersey is introducing a new program to provide certification for UAS pilots.
ABJ, which is a provider of UAS and commercial UAS services, will provide the instructors for the program, as well as the most up to date, hands-on UAS technology.
ABJ will also include MCCC students in its network of commercial UAS pilots, with opportunities for employment after they complete the UAS curriculum.
Geomni launches UAS service for property inspections
Geomni, which is a Verisk Analytics business that is centered around an “address- and location-based database of property-related analytics,” has announced a new service in which customers can dispatch a licensed, qualified UAS pilot to collect imagery and data about a structure.
Using the data collected during the UAS inspection, a Geomni Property data package is created. The package includes “ultrahigh-resolution imagery and 3D exterior roof and wall details that fully integrate with North America’s most widely used repair estimating system.”
The data collected during the inspection augments the data available from Geomni’s expansive database of imagery collected across the country by the company’s fleet of aircraft.
From Xponential to UTM framework: ICAO seeks harmonized approach
Continuing a process that kicked off at AUVSI’s Xponential conference in Dallas earlier this year, the International Civil Aviation Organization is seeking to develop a global concept of operations for an unmanned aircraft traffic management system.
ICAO’s remotely piloted aircraft program manager, Leslie Cary, issued a request for information for UTM systems at Xponential, and ended up receiving 76 proposals from industry, academia and others.
That led to the Drone Enable conference, held Sept. 22-23 in Montreal, at ICAO’s headquarters, where the developers of many of those proposals gathered to discuss what a global UTM framework should include.
Mississippi State University uses UAS to take aerial photos during football game
A UAS was used to take aerial photos of the college football game between Mississippi State University (MSU) and Louisiana State University (LSU) on Saturday, September 16.
The MSU Raspet Flight Research Laboratory, which leads FAA and Department of Homeland Security UAS research, led this mission, which was just the second mission of its kind to receive approval from the FAA.
“While the operation was not particularly complex, the FAA authorization to perform the flight was extremely unique,” says Raspet Center graduate research assistant Madison Dixon, via the Starkville Daily News.
Northland Community and Technical College receives grant to advance UAS and Geospatial Education
The National Science Foundation (NSF), Advanced Technological Education (ATE) division, has awarded a grant worth $599,997 to East Grand Forks, Minnesota’s Northland Community and Technical College (NCTC), in partnership with St. Cloud State University (SCSU), which is located in St. Cloud, Minnesota.
As an independent federal agency, the NSF supports research and education throughout the United States in all fields of engineering and science.
According to its website, the NSF receives “more than 48,000 competitive proposals for funding,” each year, and makes “about 12,000 new funding awards.”
Virginia's Stafford County Sheriff's Office uses UAS to find missing high school student
In Virginia, the Stafford County Sheriff’s Office is crediting its UAS for helping to locate a missing high school student.
The student, an 18-year-old young man, was reported missing on Monday, September 18, around 5:00 p.m., after not returning home after school.
The student had no history of running away, and the Sheriff’s Office believed that he might be endangered.
Resource Group provides flight training in Kosovo focused on UAS use in mine action
After three months of working together, the Unmanned Aviation Services division of United Kingdom-based Resource Group and MAT Kosovo—which is part of the PCM Group, and specializes in international mine action standards training—organized a week-long flight school in Kosovo that focused on UAS use within the “specific requirements of the Explosive Remnants of War (ERW) field.”
During the flight training course, which started on September 16, operational users, system developers and academics received training from Resource Group, which allowed them to learn and share their current experiences.