Accidents
A Dutch artist has turned his dead cat Orville, named after the famous aviator Orville Wright, into a helicopter – dubbed the Orvillecopter. After the cat was killed by a car, and followed by a period of mourning, visual artist Bart Jansen had Orville stuffed before enlisting the help of radio
Commercial
NASA's Global Hawk over Edwards Air Force Base - Photo: NASA / Carla Thomas Beginning this summer and over the next several years, NASA will be sending unmanned aircraft dubbed "severe storm sentinels" above stormy skies to help researchers and forecasters uncover information about hurricane formation and
Business
Flying Robots debuted the FR102+ at the RPAS 2012 Conference currently being held in Paris. Since 2004, Flying Robots SAS France has developed a unique know-how on soft wing para-motors and UAS. The last development is the FR102, which integrates several aerial surveillance and satellite communication systems. Thanks to a
Commercial
University of Granada researchers have developed a 3D imaging system that scans 3D models of historical buildings using data obtained from an unmanned aircraft. This is the first 3D imaging system to combine the use of UAS, image-based 3D modeling technologies, and virtual representation of models to produce a realistic
Commercial
UK aerial survey company Bluesky has launched a fast response aerial survey service using state of the art unmanned aircraft. The technology, originally developed by the military, includes Artificial Intelligence (AI) guided autopilot, high resolution integrated camera and environmentally friendly rechargeable propulsion system. Autonomous take-off and landing ensures the system
Commercial
Gene Robinson runs his company, RP Flight Systems, out of Wimberley. They’ve given emergency manage crews across the nation an eye in the sky, assisting in everything from fires to missing person searches. "In the field or in a tactical situation, if you have an eye in the
Commercial
The need to access weeds in dangerous or remote areas with spraying rigs may soon be a thing of the past. In an Australian first, farmers, miners and other land managers in the central west were treated to a demonstration of how unmanned helicopters can be used for weed management.
Commercial
Lian Pin Koh, an ecologist at the ETH Zürich, and Serge Wich, a biologist at the University of Zürich and PanEco, have built their own unmanned aircraft equipped with cameras, sensors and GPS for $2,000. They have already used the remote-controlled aircraft to map deforestation, count orang-utans and other
Commercial
A mystery object, thought to be a military or law enforcement drone, flying in controlled airspace over Denver had a near miss with a commercial jet last week. The pilot of the Cessna jet radioed air traffic controllers to warn them that “A remote controlled aircraft” had flown past his
Commercial
The Federal Aviation Administration authorized the Polk County Sheriff's Office to fly an unmanned aircraft armed with a camera from August 2009 to August 2010. The modified Easy Star ready-to-fly, radio-controlled plane was flown more than 400 feet above a portion of the Green Swamp, north of Lakeland.
Commercial
ESTEIO Engenharia e Aerolevantamentos S.A. and Instituto Tecnológico SIMEPAR signed a Technical Cooperation Agreement that visualizes the joint action of these companies in the market of mapping and monitoring with the use of UAS platform. UAS and Low Altitude Photogrammetry are shown as a set of techniques for collecting
Commercial
The film industry is turning to UAS to produce exciting images at sensible prices. A beauty shot that used to be possible only with a noisy, polluting passenger helicopter can now be achieved with the flick of a thumb. The camera is mounted on an electric drone called a quadrocopter,