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AIR SAR
Unmanned aerial vehicle competition focuses on SAR
by Andrea Fournier
Canada will host its first Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) student design
competition with the focus on search and rescue.
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| Artist's rendition of the Heron UAV.
The potential for search and rescue is the focus for Canada's first
ever Unmanned Aerial Vehicle Competition. |
UVS Canada, a non-profit association representing public and private
interest in unmanned vehicle systems, will host the competition.
As part of the challenge, competitors will be asked to find a missing
person and wreckage from a downed air craft in a 2 km2
competition area.
UAVs are not currently used in search and rescue, but the technology is
prevalent in military operations for surveillance and combat.
Major Graham Newbold, a senior analyst with the National Search and Rescue
Secretariat, says UAVs are effective in military applications hence the
interest in the crossover to civilian applications, such as search and
rescue.
"The primary use of the system is to search, provide communication
relay and, perhaps in the future, to drop survival equipment to supply
survivors until search and rescue forces can reach them," said Major
Newbold.
The goal of the competition is to help advance the current state of knowledge,
technology and use of design standards in Canada. Other countries have
hosted similar competitions with focuses on both civilian and defence.
Andrew Carryer, competition technical director, says the competition has
been in the works for several years. Canadian teams were entering other
international competitions and seeing how much interest there was building
in Canada, this is the right time for a Canadian competition.
Four Canadian universities have entered the competition - L'École
de technologie supérieure in Montreal, Université de Sherbrooke,
University of Alberta, and the University of Calgary.
General Dynamics Canada, the recipient of the 2005 UVS Canada Organization
Award, has donated $15,000 for this year's competition.
The competition will be judged by a panel of experts. There are two phases.
First, teams submit a written technical proposal by Mar. 15, 2006. Second,
in 2007, teams demonstrate their proposal in one of three locations, still
to be chosen.
"In doing this competition we get to raise awareness about what is
already out there, as well as push the standards, like interoperability
standards," said Carryer.
"This competition is really a joint effort between government, industry
and academia."
Andrea Fournier was a co-op student at the National Search and Rescue
Secretariat in spring 2006.
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