Robots, Drones & Cities: Seven Stories

Drones? Robotics? Artificial intelligence? These technologies are quickly becoming mainstream, and cities are hopping on board. Don’t believe me? Here are seven stories of innovative technologies being used in ingenious ways.

Environmental Assessment

Hurricane prone Horry County, South Carolina, has begun deploying drones to track beach erosion. GovTech.com reports that the drones began working just days before Hurricane Matthew struck in October and collected information on sand dunes that were destroyed by the storm. The data enabled them to file information with the federal government in hopes of securing beach renewal funding in days instead of months.

The drones are now collecting baseline data on the coast that will be used to track future erosion and map beach renourishment. The drones take static photos, not videos, at about 400 feet in the air. The Horry County IT/GIS staff post the flight schedules on the county website. According to MyrtleBeachOnline, the county plans to use the drones in the future to help set fees for commercial sites by calculating the impervious surfaces of new developments. They also plan on purchasing an infrared lens for the drones that will be used by emergency personnel in search and rescue missions.

Public Safety

Taking the body cam one step further, Amazon has been granted a patent for a small voice activated drone. The company envisions the drone being used by police, and according to Digital Trends the drone will be an “unmanned aerial vehicle assistant that sits on the shoulders of law enforcers until called into action.” There are hopes that this drone will assist law enforcement officers in a wide variety of ways, from gathering data during routine stops, to investigating a threatening object in detail from a safe distance to locating objects, including fleeing suspects. The combination of the drone being part of an officer’s equipment, and being able to travel beyond the officer’s location through voice commands, makes this technology a potential game changer for public safety.

The fire department does not get left out of the drone revolution, with ambulance and firefighting drones being developed to save lives. By flying a straight-line route above any traffic at 62 miles per hour, the ambulance drone expects to reach heart attack and other patients in a tenth of the time as ground based emergency personnel. The drone is a flying medical tool kit with defibrillator paddles and other devices, and emergency personnel are able to remotely see the patient through the drone’s cameras and communicate with people on the use of these tools. This stirring video shows how the ambulance drone could work. The New York City Fire Department will soon begin using surveillance drones at large incidents, and while this fire suppression drone is clearly just an idea at this point, it does inspire potential uses of drones in the future.

Quality of Life

In addition to public safety, cities are tasked with improving quality of life. The Redwood City Council in California recently voted to become a test city for London-based Starship Technology’s delivery robots. These robots travel on sidewalks and city streets at a leisurely four miles per hour, and will deliver groceries and meals. In addition to providing a service for local businesses and their customers, it is hoped that the use of delivery robots will take cars off the streets and improve traffic. City leaders also see this as a way to let tech companies know that the city is a technology hub (NBC Bay Area).

Economic Development

In an effort to lure technology companies to central New York, last week Governor Andrew Cuomo announced that the state would spend $30 million on a 50-mile unmanned aircraft systems corridor in central New York. The state is partnering with Griffiss Airforce Base, one of six nationally selected drone testing sites, and a private sector alliance called New Air. The governor stated that the corridor would be “the most sophisticated testing area in the country. You wouldn’t have line of sight issues, all of the clearances would be done, there would be special landing strips, it would be designed specifically for this purpose. We believe we can have it up and operational in 2018.”

Controlling the Drones of Others

While many cities are investing in unmanned vehicle technology, there are also concerns about regulating drones and other autonomous vehicles. Clearly this technology can be used for destructive as well as helpful purposes, and technologies are being developed to help cities and other agencies deal with unwanted unmanned vehicles.

An anti-drone shoulder rifle is under development and would allow law enforcement officers or other officials to remove a drone from the air by shooting an electrical pulse at it. While the device looks like a rifle, it doesn’t shoot bullets, avoiding shrapnel that could harm people on the ground. It’s not available commercially yet, but the DroneDefender developed by Batelle, is under development and can bring down drones within a 30 degree cone from where it is deployed.

To continuously protect an area from entry by drones, Liteye Systems has developed an anti-UAV defense system. The product places directional radio antennas on top of fixed posts, and can be used for surveillance as well as to disable unwanted drones within its range. A system like this could eventually provide permanent protection to airports and other areas where private drones could interfere with the safety and operations of an area.

If all else fails, a security company in the Netherlands has found a low tech way to get rid of unwanted drones. Guard from Above is training eagles, yes, birds, to intercept and remove drones from the air. See the video here.