This project is focused towards the development of an incident command decision support solution that is designed to enable generation of accurate situational awareness in a wildfire situation by providing advantages in safety, cost, and ability to gather real-time data. The technology, consisting of ground station software that would work in conjunction with an Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) with onboard sensing and communication facilities, would allow UAV control, data processing, and visualization. Real-time fire monitoring and prediction using UAVs requires engineering knowledge across multiple disciplines. This technology combines real-time image processing with telemetry to develop estimation and prediction models based on weather and vegetation information of the area. This technology will be one of the first to integrate the various elements of fire prediction and monitoring into one comprehensive technological tool.
Integrating real-time UAV sensory data into effective fire-predictor software will allow an incident commander to make timely and informed decisions which can optimize the resource allocation process and save lives. Wildland fires across the globe pose a serious environmental and socio-economic threat with far-reaching consequences. In addition to loss of lives and long-term repercussions on human health, wildland fires have severe effects on ecological biodiversity and adverse economic impacts on the affected areas with timber and infrastructure losses, lost wages, and rehabilitation costs, in addition to firefighting costs. Data collection and its interpretation for generation of situational awareness, known as Emergency Informatics, is a major challenge in responding to any large-scale hazard or disaster. This research, leveraging the use of UAVs for wildfire monitoring, can yield tools at the disposal of incident managers that will provide improved situational awareness and help them make decisions in complex situations resulting in societal benefits such as cost savings, safety of lives and properties, and benefits to the environment.
The project focused on evaluating the commercialization potential of incident command decision support solution that would enable generation of accurate situational awareness during wildfires and structural fires by providing advantages in safety, cost, and ability to gather real-time data. The product, consisting of ground station software that would work in conjunction with an Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) with onboard sensing and communication facilities, would allow UAV control, data processing, and visualization. The project activities included: (i) attending two ICORPS workshops held in San Francisco, CA and weekly video-conference meeting during July-Aug., 2013, (ii) developing a business model canvas and interviewing potential customers to validate/modify the model, (iii) developing a basic UAV platform and demonstrating the use of the proposed product to wildfire and structural fire-fighters. Intellectual Merit: The product proposed by the ICORPS team consists of ground control station software that would work in conjunction with an Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) that has onboard sensing and communication faculties. The intellectual merit of the proposed product lies in the software that allows UAV control, data processing, and visualization. Integrating real-time UAV sensory data into effective fire-predictor software allows an incident commander to make timely and informed decisions that can optimize the resource allocation process and save lives. The product also offers ease of use by first responders. During the ICORPS project, the team interviewed 103 customers during which several of the hypotheses of the business model canvas were verified and several others were modified. In particular, the ICORPS team found that, apart from wildfire fighting, the product would find wider application in urban fire and rescue operations. The customer interviews also led to the formation of customer archetypes based on decision-making and budgeting processes involved with different local fire departments, and state and national agencies associated with fire-fighting. Broader Impacts: There are several potential impacts of the proposed product to society, primarily in the arena of emergency management. The proposed product will yield tools to incident managers that will provide improved situational awareness and help them make decisions in complex situations resulting in huge cost savings, safety of lives and properties, and benefits to the environment. The technologies generated in this research will be applicable to a wide variety of disaster management scenarios. With the imminent inclusion of UAVs in the national airspace, the technologies developed in this research will have wide potential in a number of other civilian applications such as law enforcement, border patrol, and perimeter surveillance. The project provided extensive training to the PI, Entrepreneur Lead, and Mentor on taking steps for transitioning research into a commercial product. The project also trained a postdoctoral research associate and five undergraduate students on software/hardware integration towards UAV platform development. Many of these students participated in customer demonstrations which gave them exposure to interacting with customers, engineering solutions for real-world problems, and deploying in critical environments. The undergraduate students involved with this project benefitted from the ICORPs teams’ experience on business model development gained during this project and have launched a startup company.
