Autonomous Aerial Firefighting

Introduction

The European Space Agency [1] estimates fire affects four million square kilometres of land every year – approximately half the size of Australia. Despite being a natural phenomenon, wildfires have the potential to devastate an environment. Today, their catastrophic affects are being exacerbated by climate change [2]. Warmer conditions are drying out vegetation, which increases their flammability and as a result wildfires are becoming more frequent, widespread and severe. Aerial detection and firefighting methods have long been adopted to combat wildfires. Many types of aircraft are currently in service, including helicopters and fixed-wing planes [3]. These aircraft have the ability to discharge massive volumes of water or retardant either directly onto wildfire ‘hot spots’ or indirectly to create/strengthen control lines [4]. In order to continue combating wildfires, current technologies will need to be developed to deliver higher levels of productivity and safety than today’s human controlled systems. One potential solution is the use of autonomous aerospace systems [5]. Research groups around the world [6–8] are exploring this emerging technology, in particular Airbus with their Wayfinder project which achieved an aviation world-first in 2020: fully autonomous taxiing, take-off and landing of a commercial aircraft [9].

Task

Your task is to research and evaluate existing aerial firefighting strategies and design a solution that implements autonomous technology that either enhances human safety or boosts productivity when tackling wildfires. Your team should define a wildfire prone region before developing a conceptual, but practicable, design that offers an improvement over a current human controlled system. Concepts may address wildfire detection, suppression or related rescue operations but should exist in the form of a physical product that is either a development of an existing aerial aircraft system or a novel solution altogether. 

Considerations

·      Environment

Consider what natural resources and/or man-made infrastructure surround the region you have identified as being susceptible to wildfires. How will the environment effect the suitability of your solution?

·      Technology

Is the autonomous technology you plan on implementing well-established? How does it function? And how will it improve upon current human controlled methods?

·      Safety

Who will you aim to improve safety for – pilots or people on the ground? You should highlight how and by what margin safety has been improved, the latter should be quantified wherever possible.

·      Productivity

You should highlight and quantify the improvements in productivity your solution provides when compared with the conventional approach.

·      Costs

A full breakdown of costs should be provided. Is your solution affordable and worth the cost of implementing?

·      Sustainability

Your solution should be robust and include elements of future-proofing. Moreover, material selection as well as details of how your solution will be powered and maintained should be provided.

References

[1]  European Space Agency Climate Office, Multi-Decade Global Fire Dataset Set To Support Trend Analysis, (2021). 

       https://climate.esa.int/de/news-events/multi-decade-global-fire-dataset-set-support-trend-analysis/ [Accessed October 10, 2023).

[2]  T. Artés, D. Oom, D. de Rigo, T.H. Durrant, P. Maianti, G. Libertà, J. San-Miguel-Ayanz, A global wildfire dataset for the analysis of fire regimes and fire 

       behaviour, Sci. Data. 6 (2019) 1–11. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41597-019-0312-2.

[3]  Firefighting Aircraft Recognition Guide, (n.d.) 20. www.fire.ca.gov.

[4]  The Scottish Government., Wildfire Operational Guidance. Technical Report., 2013. [ Accessed October 10, 2023]. https://www.gov.scot/publications/fire-rescue-service-wildfire-operational-guidance/documents/

[5]  Insight, The Journey towards Autonomy in Civil Aerospace, August, 2020.

[6]  L. Newton, Autonomous Systems | NASA, (2021). https://www.nasa.gov/feature/autonomous-systems [Accessed October 10, 2023].

[7]  Aerospace autonomy laboratory, (n.d.). https://www.cranfield.ac.uk/facilities/aerospace-autonomy-lab [Accessed October 10, 2023].

[8]  Autonomy in Aerospace - Centre for Autonomous Systems - University of Liverpool, (n.d.). 

  https://www.liverpool.ac.uk/autonomous-systems/research-themes/autonomy-in-aerospace/? [Accessed October 10, 2023).

[9]  Airbus, Wayfinder Project, (n.d.). https://acubed.airbus.com/projects/wayfinder/ [Accessed October 10, 2023).