Researchers have devised a unique 'swarm' system using smart unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) that could make mountain search and rescue a lot quicker and cheaper than using helicopters.
A group of Loughborough University students were challenged to design and develop a UAV capable of finding a person in a search and rescue mission for a group project as part of their final year degree.
What they came up was a system which is potentially cheaper than using helicopters and quicker than rescuers on quad bikes.
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Project team leader Thomas Offord believes that if those following in their footsteps can perfect a system that uses up to 10 UAVs, all working together, it could grab the interest of mountain rescue teams.
Thomas points out that it is a prototype and admits there are still hurdles to overcome which could take two or three years.
"We have designed it for mountain rescue but it could be used for other things, like police searches and border control," said Thomas.
The swarm system uses up to 10 UAVs operating together, flying at about 80-88 kph and able to search an area of 12 square miles using global positioning system (GPS).
Each has an infra-red camera, and they can 'talk' to each other, so as long as one is in range of base they can all communicate with the rescue team.
The students have developed an image processing code that enables the cameras to detect human beings.
However, due to the time constraints of a seven month project, the images can only be downloaded and processed after the UAVs have returned to base. The next stage is to do this in real time.
The students used the fuselage of a Skywalker X8, made their own wings and tail, and used computational fluid dynamics, backed up by wind tunnel testing, to make sure the UAVs flew and could withstand gusts of wind up to 64kph.
"It's very impressive stuff and there's no reason why it should not be used one day. UAVs are already used in America for border patrols," said Simon Howroyd, a PhD student researching long endurance UAVs.
"A lot of search and rescue teams are charities, so anything to reduce costs is good. This would be cheaper than calling out helicopters which are expensive," he said.
