UavInTheNews

National health in South Africa
Uav in the news * http://www.nhls.ac.za/about_news.html * http://www.avcom.co.za/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=16&t=8536&start=0

Cost free war
http://www.opednews.com/populum/diarypage.php?did=12861

Satellite communication with UAV
Use an UnmannedAerialVehicles fitted with a http://www.thuraya.com/ satellite phone to stream back real-time pictures of illegal fishing operations. Where there is no satellite coverage deploy WiMax or suitable RadioModems on the UAV's and use them as aerial relay stations. Launce the UAV's from a ship permanently of the coast.

High resolution pictures processed on return
http://www.theengineer.co.uk/Articles/308178/A+drone+of+your+own.htm Essex University's Prof Owen Holland, a consultant for one of the 11 competitors, Team Swarm, explained the benefits of using a swarm approach: 'Swarming has many proven advantages. Most importantly, it can survive unexpected events. If one vehicle is suddenly lost, the swarm reconfigures itself to complete the task.'

Team Swarm used eight quadrotors called Owls. Their operator used three-dimensional planning software to swiftly plan and rehearse routes for the Owls over Copehill Down village. The craft then flew those routes, taking hundreds of high-resolution images. On their return, these images were processed by a cluster of 10 powerful multi-processor PCs, which analysed each image using the University of Surrey's threat recognition software. Within minutes, the operator had produced a map of Copehill Down showing the location and type of all recognised threats.

The winner of the Grand Challenge was Team Stellar, which entered Saturn — an integrated system with one high-flying and one mini-UAV and an unmanned ground vehicle, with a control station fusing data from visual, thermal and radar sensors. It was awarded the highest score by a panel of judges after its vehicles successfully identified a range of threats planted in the village, including actors dressed as militia.

License the Surrey software to South Africa
The SA government should purchase a country wide license from Surrey and ImageProcessing companies to implement automated crime prevention measures via UnmannedAerialVehicles, UnlimitedBandwidth and CctvCameras. Each SAPS station must have a software license and aerial drones.

Farm patrolling in Africa
From http://www.tacticalaerospacegroup.com/border_patrol.html BR Securing national borders against illegal immigration or smuggling, particularly in rugged or desolate areas, requires constant surveillance of known or suspected zones of activity that may measure hundreds of square miles. TAG UAVs can support border patrol operations by providing a highly flexible aerial surveillance capability. With an operating range in excess of 500 miles, TAG UAVs can patrol known zones of activity for extended periods of time. Equipped with a gyro-stabilized EO/IR imaging system, TAG UAVs can effectively monitor areas of interest in darkness, poor weather and rugged terrain, transmitting real-time intelligence to a ground station via datalink. TAG UAVs can also be used as an airborne repeater station to assist communications with patrol units at extreme range. This is the sort of stuff farmers must organize using a FrontingCompany

Tracking bandits in dense bush
http://www.zeenews.com/articles.asp?rep=2&aid=355491&sid=REG&ssid= BR Nagpur, Feb 20: Unmanned Ariel Vehicle (UAV) is all set to be deployed in eastern Maharashtra to trace the movements of Naxals, a senior police official of Anti-Naxalite Operation (ANO) said today. The UAV over Naxal-infested Gadchiroli district is likely to be operational sometime next week, said inspector general of police, anti-Naxal operations, Pankaj Gupta. Gupta told reporters that UAV's operation in Chattisgarh was quite successful and the authorities have received photo and video images both from cameras fitted in the flying machine. It has traced the movement of Naxalites near the hilly terrain of Abuzmadd in Bastar district which is a virtual den of the outlawed extremists. The images of Naxal training camps, organised in thick and dense forests in Abuzmadd area of Bastar region of Chattisgarh are very clear and reveal a lot of things which the official declined to mention.

Quad UAV
The UK police will use http://www.microdrones.com/ UAV fleets * http://www.flightglobal.com/articles/2007/07/17/215507/uk-home-office-plans-national-police-uav-fleet.html and * http://www.merseyside.police.uk/html/news/news/may/cd21-05b-police.htm - See RateGyro2 for quadrocopter.

LA police
http://times.hankooki.com/lpage/nation/200702/kt2007021913453611950.htm The Los Angeles Police Department is operating a Sky Seer to monitor crime within the city. That UAV has an built-in global positioning system and can stay airborne for 70 minutes, flying at 48 kilometers per hour. Each unit costs $25,000-$30,000.

Links

 * http://www.sacbee.com/111/story/836413.html Border patrol targeting marijuana.
 * http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/revealed-robot-spyplanes-to-guard-europes-borders-481057.html Europe border patrol
 * http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2006/aug/04/israel.syria Israel drones over Lebanon