Lifeboat Foundation

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A US Robotics company is adding new artificial intelligence anomaly detection capabilities to its autonomous Scout System drone. A leading US provider of private wireless data, drone and automated data has announced that the new containment capabilities will enable oil and gas customers to minimize environmental risks, clean-up costs, fines, and litigation expenses.

Suasnews.com reports that the loss of containment analytics feature will accelerate early detection and location of crude oil leaks before they become critical to customers by providing frequent, autonomous inspections of oil and gas pumpjacks, heater treaters, tanks, pipes, pumps, and more via the autonomous Scout System. Autonomous drones have become a crucial component to ensuring safety and conducting regular inspections within the oil and gas industry.

War is changing. As drones replace snipers, we must consider the ethics of autonomous weapons making life or death decisions.

Circa 2019 😀 What a fun mind controlled toy drone 😗

How much more fun could drones be if you got fiddly hand controllers out of the way and flew them with your mind? That’s the question EEGSmart poses with its UDrone mini-quad, which responds to brainwaves and head movements instead of thumbsticks. It’s not perfect, but it does give a glimpse of a mind-controlled future.

Continue reading “Review: Hands-free flight with EEGSmart’s mind-controlled UDrone” »

These include aquatic drones that can be programmed to scoop up floating debris from the surface of rivers, and buggies that use artificial intelligence (AI) to search for and pick up litter for use on beaches.

Scientists are also hoping to scale up the use of magnetic nano-scale springs that hook on to microplastics and break them down.

Continue reading “MailOnline takes a look at technologies to remove plastic in oceans” »

In an effort to increase livestock productivity, Rwanda is using drones to deliver aid to farmers. Road transportation is proving to be challenging.

#Rwanda #Aid #Farmers.

Continue reading “Rwanda uses drones to deliver aid to farmers as road transportation proves challenging | WION” »

As organizations increasingly look to employ drones for everything from deliveries to pest control to surveillance, safety in the skies is becoming an issue that demands more attention. Regulations around drones and their flight vary widely between countries and regions, but to really start scaling the technology there will need to be more standardization in terms of who can fly where, how fast, how high, etc.

The UK is taking the lead on drone mobility, with an announcement this week of plans to build a 165-mile (265 kilometer) “drone superhighway.” Project Skyway is being led by Altitude Angel, a UK aerospace and unified traffic management company, and involves a consortium of other stakeholders, including British Telecommunications Group.

Continue reading “A 165-Mile Drone Superhighway Will Soon Be Built in the UK” »

Counter-drone systems typically attack a UAV’s radio control or GPS systems, disabling pilot control as well as pre-programmed missions. But British defense tech company QinetiQ has now demonstrated a laser-controlled drone these systems can’t stop.

BEC was kind enough to share a parts list of everything used to create this project. It’s operated primarily by a Raspberry Pi Zero 2 W, with most components housed neatly inside an acrylic cylinder. It’s driven by a drone propeller alongside a couple of Pololu 2,130 DRV8833 Dual H-bridge motor drivers. The sensors include both a pressure sensor and a distance sensor, while a Lego Rechargeable 9V Battery Box supplies the power with the assistance of a Pololu 2,123 S7V8F5 5V voltage regulator.

The Raspberry Pi runs Raspberry Pi OS, while the code used to operate the submarine functions is handled using a custom Python script. BEC explains that Thonny was used to run the Python code, which is open-source and available for anyone to explore.

Continue reading “Raspberry Pi Zero 2 W Lego-Powered Submarine Makes a Splash” »

Designed for precision agriculture and environmental management use cases, the P4 Multispectral drone combines data from six separate sensors to measure the health of crops. It can be used to monitor everything from individual plants to entire fields, as well as weeds, insects, and a variety of soil conditions.

The P4 Multispectral drone is compatible with standard industry workflows including flight programming, mapping, and analytics software from DJI and other leading providers. Using the DJI GS Pro application, you can create automated and repeatable missions including flight planning, mission execution, and flight data management. Data collected can be easily imported into DJI Terra or a suite of third-party software including Pix4D Mapper and DroneDeploy, for analysis and to generate additional vegetation index maps.

Continue reading “DJI releases new firmware update for Phantom 4 Multispectral drone” »