The EconomistJanuary 20th 2018 Science and technology 69S
MALL multicopter drones—souped-up
versions of those sold by the million as
Christmas toys—have tremendous poten-
tial for use in industryand agriculture.
Rather than erecting scaffolding or bring-
ing in a mechanical platform to inspect
things like roofs and chimneys, the job can
be done instantly, and probably for less
money, by sending up a drone-mounted
camera. Drones can also fly along pipe-
lines and power cables, checking for dam-
age faster than a ground-based operation
could manage. Similarly, they can survey
fields for signs of pest or drought at a frac-
tion of the cost of a manned flight.
Most existing drones do, however, need
to be flown by an experienced operator. In-
deed, the law often requires this. Drones
also need technical support and mainte-
nance. And the people operating them
would be well advised to have an under-
standing of the legal and safety implica-
tions of what they are up to. Hence the ap-
peal of the “drone-in-a-box”. This is a term
being applied to the offerings of several
firms that aspire to sell the advantages of
drones without the associated worries.
The box in question is a base station
that houses the drone, recharges it and
transfers the data it has collected to the cus-
tomer. The drone may fly autonomously,
according to a preprogrammed schedule,
find its way automatically to a point it is or-
dered to visit, or be piloted remotely by an
operative of the company that supplies the
system, from a control centre anywhere on
the planet.Feel the buzz
One of the most advanced drone-in-a-box
systems is produced by Airobotics, an Is-
raeli company. In this case the box is made
of metal and is aboutthe size of a garden
shed. Ahatch in the roof opens and
through it a purpose-built quadcopter
called Optimus lifts off to fly a prepro-
grammed route. After each such tour it re-
turns, and its part-used battery is swapped
for a freshly charged one by a robot arm
within the box.
Airobotics’ first contract for this system
is with Israel Chemicals (ICL). In this case
the drone’s job is stock control. It monitors
ICL’s phosphate-rock mining and process-
ing operation in the Negev desert, by mea-
suring the dimensions of recently mined
piles of the stuff—and thus the amount of
rock they contain. That task was previously
carried out by a human being scramblingover the heaps with survey tools. Now it is
done with 3Dphotography and computer
modelling. The drone method is quicker
and easier, and does not require the site to
be closed to trucks for safety reasons. It is
also completely automated. The drone
knows when to fly, what route to take, and
what to do en route.
Atlas Dynamics, another firm with Is-
raeli roots (though it is now based in Lat-
via) is following swiftly in Airobotics’
wake. Its drone garage, which it refers to as
a “Nest”, is smaller than that of its rival
(about the size of a fridge-freezer), is made
of carbon fibre, and can accommodate sev-
eral drones. Those drones, which it calls At-
las Pros, are different, too. An Atlas Pro has
three engines and unlike mosthelicopter
drones, which are regular polygons with a
lifting propeller at each vertex, it has a clear
front and back. In its case, two propellers
are mounted forward and one at the rear.
The trick is that the struts holding the front
propellers are also aerofoils that provide
lift during forward flight, meaning the
drone combines the characteristics of a he-
licopter with those of a fixed-wing aircraft.
This provides stability, meaning the craft
can fly in winds that a conventional multi-
copter could not handle.
According to Guy Cherni, the boss of At-las Dynamics, the firm’s first target market
is security. If an alarm is tripped at a fence
or gate, for example, a drone will launch it-
self automatically from the Nest to provide
a close-up view of the potential incursion
point. Drones can also be programmed to
carry out regular patrols, or sent on one-off
human-controlled missions by means of a
simple map-based app.
A third company, Airmada, of Boston,
Massachusetts, has taken a slightly differ-
ent approach from these other two firms.
Rather than go to the expense of develop-
ing its own robot aircraft, it has designed a
base station that can accommodate any
brand of commercial drone in line with the
customer’s desire. Again, this station
swaps out the drone’s battery and enables
the remote operation of what is, in essence,
a security and surveillance system for in-
dustrial plants.
Another Boston-based firm—Green-
Sight Agronomics—has a different sort of
plant in itssights, the sort that grows. It of-
fers a boxed drone for surveying farms and
golf courses. Its drone is fitted with a
“multispectral” camera tuned to be sensi-
tive to specific wavelengths of light, includ-
ing some in the infra-red. This permits it to
detect health-related changes in vegetation
before they are visible to the naked eye.Ruling the skies
GreenSight is also tackling the question of
how drones are regulated. At the moment,
American law requires someone who can
see the drone to be in ultimate charge of it.
Moreover, that person must have passed
an exam to qualify as a drone pilot. In De-
cember, though, the Federal Aviation Ad-
ministration gave GreenSight a waiver
from this law which permits a qualified pi-
lot to fly drones remotely, from Boston.
At the moment, this waiver saves no
manpower, for an observer on the ground
must still follow the flight and be able to
take control in an emergency. GreenSight
hopes, though, that this will never need to
happen and that, by giving an extended
demonstration of the fact that remote fly-
ing can be done safely, a further relaxation
of the rules will eventually do away with
the job of observer.
In Israel, Airobotics has already gone
through a similar process: Optimus drones
are now able to fly unsupervised. In both
countries the authorities are being sensi-
bly cautious, but the data suggest that auto-
matic flights of the Optimus variety are saf-
er than piloted ones, particularly during
take-off and landing, when most accidents
happen. Whether this also applies to re-
mote piloting remains to be seen. But
GreenSight seems confident it will. Justin
McClellan, the firm’s chief marketing offi-
cer, hopes the strictures on observers will
change next year—indeed, he expects a
general relaxation ofthe rules, notjust for
GreenSight, but also for its competitors. 7Drones in a boxReady for take off
Making robot helicopters easier to use will increase the number in use