Prototype UAV will Conduct Aerial Fire Ignitions

Prototype UAV will Conduct Aerial Fire Ignitions

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A new Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) prototype, designed as a cheaper and safer alternative for conducting aerial ignitions of high intensity fire, is under development.

In addition to offering advantages that come with its small size, including speed and agility, the drones would remove the requirement for human led helicopters to go close to fires, which would reduce the risk to of the loss of human life.

According to the Digital Journal, to develop the appropriate types of drones, inventor Dirac Twidwell, an Agronomy & Horticulture expert from the University of Nebraska, has been working with the Nebraska Intelligent MoBile Unmanned Systems laboratory.

This collaboration has produced a prototype drone capable of launching small balls that contain chemicals capable of combusting on impact and starting a fire. The prototype craft is a small “hexacopter” which weighs just two pounds. Successful trials have already taken place using high-intensity burns in Texas.  

The fires are needed in order to restore the grasslands of the Great Plains, a broad expanse of flat land, that includes the territory west of the Mississippi River and east of the Rocky Mountains, extending through parts of the U.S. and Canada. The grassy plains of the past are becoming increasingly dominated by shrubs, and this is affecting livestock, which need grass to graze on.

The system will also be able to play a role in helping to suppress wildfires. This is in the form of tracking and relaying information about the course that fires are taking.