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Regulators, insurers, advanced drone operators and community members all need to know: what’s the actual risk of a falling drone? From the ground of Intergeo 2023: the best way to quantify the danger.
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Laura Gonzalez Combrink
Laura Gonzalez Combrink of Accenture consulting gave a presentation on their initiative to reinforce existing data sets, in an effort to determine and quantify the danger of falling drones. Quantifying this risk, Gonzalez says, could possibly be foundational to reaching the following level of integration of drones into existing airspace.
It’s a major problem. Risk-based operations require accurate assessment of the bottom risk of falling drones: but that depends upon an accurate understanding of who’s more likely to be on the bottom if a drone falls. To find out the danger of drone missions that overlap with population centers, it’s a critical piece of drone integration. “As drones turn into more integrated with the material of on a regular basis life, determining the likelihood of this occurring is increasingly essential,” said Ms. Combrink.
GRADE: Ground Risk of Drone Operations
Simply put, GRADE, or the bottom risk of drone operations, is designed to reply the essential quesiton: how likely is a falling drone to hit someone? Currently, experts use census data: but this has limitations. “Census data is restricted, because it is static data, it doesn’t consider changes in household… it’s focused on buildings, and is infrequently updated,” says Ms. Combrink.
Ms. Combrink explains that the goal of their work on risk models is to incorporate more and relevant data: equivalent to the movement of individuals, whether or not they are more likely to be situated inside or outside of buildings, the potential of higher density based upon the time of day, and specific locations with higher density levels. At noon, for instance, a city block would have more people outside than that very same location at 3 am. Accenture uses Census data augmented by autonomous crowd data, equivalent to cell phone users and usage, population flows, and land usage information.
Enabling Autonomous Flight
Eventually, said Combrink, the results of this data set could enabled autonomous flight and advanced operations. Integrated into flight planning tools, the information could help to determine a greater and safer flight path, and possibly integrated into SORA. By avoiding populated areas at relevant times, the system would give operators more options for secure flight paths while reducing ground-based risk.
[The team is in discussions with EU regulatory authorities, but the GRADE systems has not yet been authorized by the EU for SORA usage.]
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