Drone Traffic, an aviation research and development start-up in Denver, Colorado, has won a NASA grant to create an airborne drone monitoring, reporting, and avoidance system for aircraft pilots.
Drone Traffic and its partner Mosaic ATM recently received a Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) grant to begin the first phase of the project.
According to company officials, the FAA estimates that 2.4 million drones have been sold in the United States. While most drones operate safely, the FAA continues to document more than 100 unsafe drone operations a month, including airspace violations, near-collisions, and actual collisions.
Drone Traffic founder Rick Zelenka, a patent attorney, former NASA engineer and Boeing executive, as well as a longtime pilot, recognized the need for an airborne real-time drone avoidance system and patented his solution.
The product resembles popular car-driving apps that alert drivers to important traffic risk — think Waze for pilots.
The airborne drone avoidance system acquires drone information from a variety of sources, including airborne and ground-based radar, air traffic management databases, and pilot crowd-sourcing. The system enables pilots to report drone presence and transgressions, creating a pathway to a safer flight, according to company officials.
A graphical user interface provides current flight status, future trajectory information, and safety-focused drone warning information embedded within 2D and 3D mapping displays, company officials explained. The product can be stand-alone or a supplement to existing flight applications in a pilot’s electronic flight bag, officials add.
How about equipping drones with a atmosheric pressure activated shut off switch.
Or ADS-B activated shut off switch.
Seems to me that pilots have enough to do while flying to add another layer of traffic to watch out for. I would think that the correct hierarchy would be to provide a system that keeps the drones out of the way of manned aircraft. Would probably be a bit expensive though..to make the drone monitor and somehow get out of the way of aircraft.
There is no way to force a bunch of non-aviation drone owners to obey a set of airspace rules. Yet that is the current approach the FAA is taking. And it’s ludicrous. The correct solution is to force ADS-B out on these things…at the factory. And existing drones be forced to either retrofit or be destroyed. The cat is well out of the bag and it’s the FAAs fault of course.
“A bunch?” I’ll say. 2.4 million drones vs. 200,000 GA aircraft. Do the math. The drones win. A 400-foot factory altitude limit might be a better approach.
I’d say manned aircraft vs unmanned aircraft means pilots win. Putting a toy over the safety of a human is ludicrous. I do like the altitude limiter though…or something that limits its operation within proximity to an airport..not a regulation that can be ignored, but a device that makes it inoperable..
As I pointed out. These things are not limited in any way. And the operators are not aviators. It’s the wild west and sadly each drone up there is a six shooter waiting to knock an innocent pilot out of the sky.