Direct despite the distance
Not many passengers find their way into aeroplanes in these days of the pandemic. Pilots, of course, are crucial to the continued operation of the system – or were? The current crisis would appear to have pushed technology forward, as witnessed by several drone projects.
Once upon a time it was normal that the talented youngsters who founded start-ups tended to be poached by established competitors. Nowadays, the opposite can be true too.
On 5 October San Francisco-based Iris Automation, which was founded in 2015 and which develops detect-and-avoid systems, surprised the industry – or perhaps not all that much – by naming Jon Damush as its new chief executive officer. He has more than 30 years of management experience in the aviation technology field and was last Boeing Next’s senior director for new business ventures.
For town and country
Five years ago Matternet implemented the same approach, when it employed the former head of airfreight at Swiss, Oliver Evans. The Silicon Valley-based drone corporation already has commercial partnerships in Switzerland and the USA; at the end of September it presented its first customer in Japan. In tandem with Japan Airlines it will support the Tokyo city government’s new drone logistics business development project.
So far, Matternet has proved itself over the last mile in the airspace of densely populated areas with chronically congested roads. Drone Delivery Canada, in contrast, aims to serve more distant destinations in sparsely populated regions too – and not only in its home country.
It recently agreed to its first international project, in collaboration with Astral Aerial Solutions. AAS is backed by the Kenyan freight airline Astral Aviation, whose founder and CEO, Sanjeev Gadhia, has already been looking into the possibilities of unmanned air cargo operations for some time now. He believes that “various segments in Africa can benefit from this Canadian technology, especially in the healthcare sector, and to provide services to remote communities.”
In amongst other aeroplanes
The products of the Chinese drone manufacturer EHang, which calls itself the world’s leading autonomous aerial vehicle (AAV) technology platform, already share airspace with aeroplanes for various areas and tasks.
Now it has sent the EHang 216L, the logistics version of its flagship, into the skies over Guangzhou. It can carry a 200 kg payload – more than any other AAV of this type, according to EHang. It has eight arms and 16 independent motors and propellers.
The Heron, manufactured by Israel Aerospace Industries (IAI), is more similar to an aeroplane. In mid-September the defence, aviation and space travel enterprise proved that the peaceful – and perhaps simultaneously also fruitful – coexistence of drones and aeroplanes is possible, when its unit, with a length of 8.5 m and a 16.6 m wingspan, landed at Tel Aviv international airport during normal air traffic operations. IAI is now set to market the unit commercially; it offers a 290 kg payload.
Bigger, higher, further
Unmanned aerial vehicles that are based on aeroplanes represent another level of development. In August China’s SF Express, for example, teamed up with China Aerospace Times Electronics to carry out the maiden flight of the FH-98. The unit is based on the Y-5B double decker, which in turn has been derived from the Antonov AN-2. The FH-98 has a 15 m3 cargo hold, which it can fill with 1.5 t of goods.
Last but not least there’s FedEx, which is also looking into how it can maybe use its smaller aircraft to deliver consignments without involving a pilot in future. The integrator has teamed up with Reliable Robotics to this end. In June of this year the latter firm, also from California, already brought one of FedEx’s Cessna 208 Caravans in to land without a pilot on board.
