Feb 10, 2025 06:51 PM
(This post was last modified: Feb 10, 2025 10:01 PM by C C.)
Air traffic control for drones: Engineers introduce low-cost UAV detection technology
https://www.eurekalert.org/news-releases/1073204
INTRO: With the exponential rise in drone activity, safely managing low-flying airspace has become challenging — especially in highly populated areas. Just last month an unauthorized drone collided with a ‘Super Scooper’ aircraft above the Los Angeles wildfires, grounding the aircraft for several days and hampering the firefighting efforts.
Traditional radar systems are powerful but cannot effectively detect low-flying aircraft below 400 feet. While the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) has some regulations to manage small, unmanned aircraft systems (UAS) or drones, tracking and safety can be problematic – especially in congested or restricted airspaces. BYU researchers may have the solution.
Using a network of small, low-cost radars, engineering professor Cammy Peterson and her colleagues have built an air traffic control system for drones that can effectively and accurately track anything in an identified low-altitude airspace.
“Radar has been around for a long time,” said Karl Warnick, co-author and BYU professor of electrical and computer engineering. “Instead of having a $10 million spinning dish like you’d see at an airport, we have a simple thing that could be built for a few hundred dollars. The small radars don’t have all the capabilities of a higher-end radar, but a network of small radars can work together effectively.”
Peterson explained how the drone air traffic control system works... (MORE - details, no ads)
The risk of space junk hitting planes is rising in the era of SpaceX
https://www.sciencealert.com/the-risk-of...-of-spacex
INTRO: We've yet to see a falling piece of space debris strike an airplane, but if it happens, the consequences would almost certainly be catastrophic – and according to a new study, the danger posed to planes is only rising.
The researchers behind the study, from the University of British Columbia in Canada, looked at worldwide flight data to model the distribution of planes in the sky, then compared this to records of uncontrolled rocket body reentries. The increasing risk is also being driven in part by the mass deployment of satellites, like SpaceX's Starlink, which will eventually reenter our airspace.
As more satellites and rockets are sent into orbit, and more planes take to the skies, the chances of a hit are growing, the researchers found. Even though we have the technology to track falling space debris to some extent, that's still a major concern.
"The highest-density regions, around major airports, have a 0.8 percent chance per year of being affected by an uncontrolled reentry," write the researchers in their published paper. "This rate rises to 26 percent for larger but still busy areas of airspace, such as that found in the northeastern United States, northern Europe, or around major cities in the Asia-Pacific region." (MORE - details)
https://www.eurekalert.org/news-releases/1073204
INTRO: With the exponential rise in drone activity, safely managing low-flying airspace has become challenging — especially in highly populated areas. Just last month an unauthorized drone collided with a ‘Super Scooper’ aircraft above the Los Angeles wildfires, grounding the aircraft for several days and hampering the firefighting efforts.
Traditional radar systems are powerful but cannot effectively detect low-flying aircraft below 400 feet. While the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) has some regulations to manage small, unmanned aircraft systems (UAS) or drones, tracking and safety can be problematic – especially in congested or restricted airspaces. BYU researchers may have the solution.
Using a network of small, low-cost radars, engineering professor Cammy Peterson and her colleagues have built an air traffic control system for drones that can effectively and accurately track anything in an identified low-altitude airspace.
“Radar has been around for a long time,” said Karl Warnick, co-author and BYU professor of electrical and computer engineering. “Instead of having a $10 million spinning dish like you’d see at an airport, we have a simple thing that could be built for a few hundred dollars. The small radars don’t have all the capabilities of a higher-end radar, but a network of small radars can work together effectively.”
Peterson explained how the drone air traffic control system works... (MORE - details, no ads)
The risk of space junk hitting planes is rising in the era of SpaceX
https://www.sciencealert.com/the-risk-of...-of-spacex
INTRO: We've yet to see a falling piece of space debris strike an airplane, but if it happens, the consequences would almost certainly be catastrophic – and according to a new study, the danger posed to planes is only rising.
The researchers behind the study, from the University of British Columbia in Canada, looked at worldwide flight data to model the distribution of planes in the sky, then compared this to records of uncontrolled rocket body reentries. The increasing risk is also being driven in part by the mass deployment of satellites, like SpaceX's Starlink, which will eventually reenter our airspace.
As more satellites and rockets are sent into orbit, and more planes take to the skies, the chances of a hit are growing, the researchers found. Even though we have the technology to track falling space debris to some extent, that's still a major concern.
"The highest-density regions, around major airports, have a 0.8 percent chance per year of being affected by an uncontrolled reentry," write the researchers in their published paper. "This rate rises to 26 percent for larger but still busy areas of airspace, such as that found in the northeastern United States, northern Europe, or around major cities in the Asia-Pacific region." (MORE - details)