Utah in running for unmanned aircraft research
It sounds like something out of “Star Wars” or some other science fiction tome, but it’s a reality and could be coming to Utah. The state might get a different kind of Christmas present this year — a chance to have test sites for the development of unmanned aerial systems. Officials anticipate the announcement will be made by the end of the year.
“This is as important as the day in North Carolina at Kitty Hawk when the Wright Brothers changed the face of aviation,” said Wayne Dornan, dean of the College of Aviation and Public Services at UVU. UVU is the coordinating university to create the application for the project.
State officials partnered with UVU, BYU, the University of Utah, Utah State University and Weber State University. State researchers described their expertise in unmanned aerial systems technology and said it gives a competitive edge.
Keep your fingers crossed and your hands on the controllers of the remotely controlled aircraft. They are sometimes called drones, sometimes used for spying, but these aircraft would have more down to earth uses, even though they are in the atmosphere.
If a forest fire breaks out, it can take significant time to gather the personnel and their equipment, then wait for a helicopter. With the UAS’s, it takes only minutes for a compact unmanned vehicle to get into the sky and assess the scene.
“We can do an initial survey of the fire,” Dornan said. It can do an analysis of the moisture and the wind direction and speed.
“It can determine the trajectory,” he said. “They can predict the way the fire will move. It can give some real good information how to fight this fire.”
Another application the UAS’s could be used is in agriculture. Dornan estimated 85 percent of the uses would be in public safety or agriculture.
“Say there is a bacteria affecting citrus trees in Florida,” Dornan said. “Right now they have to send someone out to see if a tree is stressed. It takes days or weeks to survey an area. With UAS, they can do in hours what a person can do in weeks.”
If Utah gets the project, it would be one of six centers in the U.S. which would provide information to the Federal Aviation Administration. It would have a huge economic impact.
“If the state is selected by the FAA, hundreds of jobs will be created and millions of dollars will be invested in Utah,” wrote Michael Sullivan, Governor’s Office of Economic Development Communications Director.
“A UAS is comprised of an unmanned aircraft and all of the associated support equipment, control station, data links, telemetry, communications and navigation equipment necessary to operate the unmanned aircraft. Coming in all shapes and sizes, unmanned aircrafts have the potential to improve the quality of life for people around the world.”
International Business Times has reported that Amazon and Domino’s might use unmanned aerial systems to deliver their goods by the end of 2015.
Marshall Wright, business director for aerospace and defense with the Governor’s Office of Economic Development, said the study could last that long.
“The FAA says that starting in 2014 through the end of 2015, testing evaluations will go on to develop regulations to operate unmanned systems,” he said. “The research will go on for a long time.”
He anticipates it will begin quickly.
“Once the announcement is made we would expect to be doing testing and evaluations surely by late spring or even before that,” he said. “Then we will find that the commercial applications will be seen within the next two years.”
Wright was optimistic about Utah’s chances.
“Utah is uniquely positioned to be the preeminent UAS test site, capable of providing the FAA with the total environment with which to test and evaluate unmanned systems which will enable the FAA to safely and responsibly integrate them into the national airspace system,” he said.
Dornan agreed about Utah’s prospects.
“I think we have a real good chance,” he said. “Of seven universities within the state, five are doing research and development on UAS. We have gotten those five to partner up. UVU is the coordinating university. The governor’s office is so happy about it. Everyone along the I-15 corridor is partnering up for this initiative.”
“We are keeping our fingers crossed,” Dornan said. “It would be extremely prestigious and would have an economic impact.”
Wright identified two types of individuals who would be involved in the project.
“There would be a lot of entrepreneurs and innovators who will get a chance to play in this new medium,” he said. “It is something we can bring to the rural areas. Places in rural Utah can be part of the aerospace industry.”
Currently, unmanned systems are flown in isolated areas, with few roads, which are not heavily populated, Dornan said. Those rural areas have been the testing grounds, but have not been as involved in the process itself.
The new project could switch the roles a bit, allowing more research to be done in rural areas, while having unmanned systems flown in more populous areas.
“We are going to have to fly into areas where it is congested and where there are airports,” Dornan said. “This will lead to a real surge of technology that we can’t even apply right now because of FAA restrictions.”
