New Uses for UASs (Article Review)

Over the past few years, the number of applications for Unmanned Aerospace Systems (UASs) have grown significantly. Prior to 2000, UASs were reserved for NASA and the Department of Defense. Today we are starting to see small businesses, real estate agencies, and industry turn to UAS platforms to accomplish tasks that were once done by humans, airplanes, or helicopters. Due to the decline in the cost of UASs and their components, as well as the recent changes to FAA regulations that let more agencies use them legally, there has been a burst of new uses for UASs. Beyond the big stories about how Amazon is trying to set up a UAS delivery service, there are smaller and less widely known applications for UASs that will greatly affect the public in the near future.

The insurance industry is starting to use UAS in order to accomplish many subtasks associated with the industry. These subtasks include disaster claim photography and video capture, 3D mapping of auto accidents, and in the future there could even be autonomous claim capture via UAS. All of these will not only save the insurance company time and money, but the savings will be passed to the consumer as well as also expedite the claim payment. This fast claim capture could also augment emergency response efforts and speed up emergency relief funding.

In the past, a task like disaster relief is often a difficult situation to assess due to the fact that transportation into and out of the affected area is either impossible or too dangerous to do just after a disaster. In the referenced article, the man made disaster in the Port of Tianjin, China caused a 3KM exclusion zone to be formed around the port for weeks while the government determined if the explosion caused any hazardous material to become airborne. While traditional insurance companies that utilize either manned aviation assets or people on the ground waited for the exclusion zone to open up, cutting edge insurance companies utilized UASs to get real time video and photographs of the affected area. This allows the insurance companies to estimate and pay out insurance claims much faster to the companies effected by the explosion.

Image of Port of Tianjin, China After an Explosion 

Flood damage and hurricane damage are also great examples of situations where UASs could safely and quickly assess claims faster than other manned or manual methods. Because the cost of UASs are going down and the quality of cameras are going up it has created a perfect situations for companies to start utilizing UASs. Even more recently, the FAA relaxed commercial small UAS regulations which will make using UASs by insurance companies even easier.  

    

References:

Lewis, C. (2016, July 18). The future is looking up for Insurance companies and drones. Retrieved September 08, 2016, from https://robotenomics.com/2016/07/18/the-future-is-looking-up-for-insurance-companies-and-drones/  

Sense and Avoid Technology for UASs... Risk Mitigation vs. Complete Risk Avoidance

The integration of unmanned aerial systems (UASs) into national airspace (NAS) has been an ongoing process that is slowly but surely making small steps to a future filled with UASs. There are multiple facets that make integrating UASs into NAS a complicated process. Questions that deal with aircraft registration, operator training, ethical responsibility, hacking and lost link procedures are all on the table when it comes to integration into NAS. One topic that has been at the front and center of the integration process is sense and avoid standards and responsibilities for UASs. Companies like Amazon, Google, and Intel are all working solutions to this challenge, but the Military and government entities like NASA are also looking for solutions to getting more robust sense and avoid technology into the skies fast.

Currently in Part 91.113 of the federal aviation regulation, it lays out the rules of the sky in terms of right of way for all aircraft. One key verbiage used is that aircraft must “see and avoid”. This does not include the ability to sense and avoid, which is the method by which a UAS would accomplish this same task. Due to this, these regulations are very limiting to UAS operation. For military UAS this means that we must have visual observers that are trained and qualified observing the aircraft at all times while operating in NAS. This creates a huge logistical addition to typical training missions and is a cumbersome task to accomplish when it comes to personnel and crew management. It is reported that the FAA is attempting to alter Part 91.113 this year in order to include sense and avoid technology as a legal substitute for see and avoid (Carey, 2013).

The Army specifically has been working with a ground based sense and avoid system (GBSAA) to augment their ability to fly in NAS. I have worked with this technology during my time as a UAS commander in the Army and have seen how beneficial proper implementation could be for units stationed in the US. GBSAA works very similarly to ground based ATC radar systems, the only difference is that it is completely dedicated to a particular UAS mission. The radar picture of both participating and non-participating aircraft is collected via LSTAR ground sensors and overlaid on the ground control station’s display and moving map that is utilized by the operator to navigate the UAS (SRC Inc., 2016). When fully functional and approved by the FAA, this system would allow the Army to fly large UASs through Military Operations Airspace (MOA). For locations like Fort Campbell, Kentucky, this would greatly expand the operational area for the multiple UAS units stationed there. 

Depiction of Ground Based Sense and Avoid System by SRC Inc. 

In the civilian sector, there is a greater focus on autonomous sense and avoid capabilities. This technology will allow for smaller UASs to go further and farther than ever before. For companies like Amazon, who want to be able to deliver merchandise via UAS, it will be imperative that they can utilize autonomous drones that will legally be authorized to travel beyond line of sight as long as they are equipped with autonomous sense and avoid technology (Popper, 2016).

Regulators are attempting to find a perfect answer to the sense and avoid issue, but the technology is currently very good, but not perfect. Some argue that the technology needs to be better, while others argue that aviation has always been about risk mitigation and not risk avoidance. Companies like Intel have produced sense and avoid systems that could reduce risk nearly to zero, but not promise a perfect solution to every scenario (Popper, 2016). Many feel that the same risk acceptance levels applied to manned aviation should be carried over to unmanned aviation rather than attempting to create a more stringent and difficult standard to achieve. What do you think is the best way forward? Please feel free to respond in the comments section below.    

References:

Carey, B. (2013, July 22). FAA Plans Unmanned 'Sense and Avoid' Rule in 2016. Retrieved August 17, 2016, from http://www.ainonline.com/aviation-news/air-transport/2013-07-22/faa-plans-unmanned-sense-and-avoid-rule-2016

FAA. (2004). Part 91 GENERAL OPERATING AND FLIGHT RULE. Retrieved August 17, 2016, from http://rgl.faa.gov/Regulatory_and_Guidance_Library/rgFAR.nsf/0/934f0a02e17e7de086256eeb005192fc!OpenDocument

Popper, B. (2016, January 16). What's really standing in the way of drone delivery? Retrieved August 17, 2016, from http://www.theverge.com/2016/1/16/10777144/delivery-drones-regulations-safety-faa-autonomous-flight

SRC Inc. (2016). Ground-Based Sense and Avoid Radar System. Retrieved August 17, 2016, from http://www.srcinc.com/what-we-do/radar-and-sensors/gbsaa-radar-system.html

What Kind of Unmanned System Will Make the Greatest Impact on Society in the Future?

I feel that future development of unmanned aerial systems (UASs) will have the greatest impact to society compared to the future impacts of unmanned marine and ground systems. The reason why I feel this way is based on three key industries that will be greatly affected by UAS development; agriculture, transportation, and defense.  These three industries account for the most important sectors of the economy according to the US Department of commerce. Agriculture is number one for the United States, but also plays an absolutely essential role in lesser developed counties as well. Transportation is essential because it links all over services and industries to the end user, and defense is important because ultimately, when politics fail, it’s the county with the best military remains in power. Marine and ground based unmanned systems will continue to develop and shape these sectors, but opening the aerial layer to industry will provide previously unobtainable perspective, convenience, and progress.

Agriculture: There are two major aspects to agriculture that will be affected by the development of UASs; precision agriculture, and crop dusting and treatment. Precision agriculture is a farming technique that uses high tech overhead imagery to observe, measure, and respond to inter and intra field variability. In the past this could only be done via satellite or manned aircraft which resulted in costs that were too high for the average farmer to afford. Today, with the introduction of UASs, every farmer, no matter how big or small, is gaining access to this ability. The use of unmanned crop dusting and crop treatment is complimented by precision agriculture. The ability to link both precision agriculture and unmanned crop treatment means a small farmer could optimize their land to provide the highest and most cost effective crop yield scientifically possible. If applied over a large enough population, this technology could change global food yield and resources for the better.

Transportation: The transportation sector is the link between industry and the end users. The transportation sector touches almost every other sector of the global economy in some way. As globalization continues, the importance of effective and fast transposition of people and goods is becoming more important every day. The ability to fly long distance global missions can be accomplished cheaper and more efficient with large scale UASs. In terms of local and hyperlocal transportation, the use of small quadcopter may become the standard method of local delivery. Amazon has been working with the FAA to start a new program in which deliveries could be made by quadcopters within a local area. This could be a start to a future of bustling UAS highways in the air. Not only could it reduce traffic, emissions, and delivery times, but it could launch counties without proper road networks into the 21^st century for minimal costs.

Defense: Currently, only a few countries rely on military UASs as heavily as the United States. It is clear that the introduction of the UAS has redefined the battlefield, but the one aspect of this technology that will effect society in the future is its availability. As UAS technology becomes cheaper and more accessible it will be spread to all international powers regardless of state affiliation, size, or political standing. In the future we could see separatist states, terrorists, or major adversaries gain access to extremely dangerous weapons and use them to disrupt peace and stability globally.  

References:

Becker, S. (2014, July 1). What Are the Most Important Sectors in the U.S. Economy? Retrieved May 20, 2015, from http://www.cheatsheet.com/business/what-are-the-most-important-sectors-in-the-u-s-economy.html/?a=viewall

Gopal, S. (2015, February 20). Drones: The Game Changers in Future Wars. Retrieved May 20, 2015, from http://www.indiandefencereview.com/news/drones-the-game-changers-in-future-wars/

Grassi, M. (2015, May 7). FAA Enters Partnerships To Consider Beyond Line-Of-Sight UAV Missions | PrecisionAg. Retrieved May 20, 2015, from http://www.precisionag.com/data/imagery/faa-enters-partnerships-to-consider-beyond-line-of-sight-uav-missions/

Jones- Cruise, C. (2015, March 18). Amazon Receives Patent for Drone Delivery System. Retrieved May 20, 2015, from http://learningenglish.voanews.com/content/amazon-receives-patent-for-drone-delivery-system/2776033.html