Soon, expect pizza delivery via drones
Soon expect food companies to deliver pizzas or other ordered utility items at your doorsteps via drones. The new-age drones, powered by solar energy or hydrogen, may fly for a day.
Industrial experts in drone technology and scientists from Dr BR Ambedkar National Institute of Technology discussed advancement in drone technology at the start of five-day intensive bootcamp on ‘Drone fundamentals: Assembly to applications’ organised at Kanya Maha Vidyalaya (KMV) here. The event is sponsored by the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY).
Imparting training to students in assembly, flying and control of drones, Capt Ashinee Kumar Acharya, working in the training wing of Odisha-based company Unmanned Warriors, shared the latest applications in drones. “More than 70 per cent present day use of drones is for sprays in agriculture and the remaining for surveillance by the defence forces or coverage of marriages and other functions. We have already tested delivery mechanism via drones in Delhi, Noida and Bengaluru. Time is not far when drones will be used on regular basis for examining of railway tracks, inspection of mining sites, property mapping and delivery of organs for transplant to hospitals. Such a technology will be more useful for areas such as in the North-East where travel time is too long”, said the expert, who has earlier served as a commercial pilot.
“We have already seen the use of swarm technology wherein 1,000-3,000 drones can be fired and controlled by a single computer for lighting up the skies in the cricket World Cup. Likewise, the scientists are working on hybrid models of drones which will use the best available features of fixed wing drones and rotorcrafts. For drones that will work on surveillance, better cameras with multi-spectral imaging are set to replace the normal RGB cameras “, Capt Acharya added as he showed video of the DRDO-developed TAPAS to the students.
Dr Sandeep Verma of NIT, who is leading the project, said already eight programmes have been held at various locations for sensitising the students regarding the upcoming technology. The students are being made aware about the newer applications of use of drones, their assembly and even technicality involved in flying them.
“Just the way phones were earlier expensive and not in the reach of commoners, the drones, which are currently in a range of Rs 1 lakh or more, are set to be more accessible for common use. A bigger market and local production will make these more easily available for common use”, he predicted. He added that NIT Jalandhar is also expected to have its own drone centre in the times to come.
