Unmanned airplanes help fight fires
Unmanned aerial vehicles can map wildfires from above. (NASA)
JB: This is Earth & Sky. Researchers with NASA and the U.S. Forest Service are collaborating to make aircraft without pilots that can monitor wildfires.
DB: These unmanned aerial vehicles, or UAVs, fly just like regular airplanes, except their controls are in the hands of pilots on the ground.
Vince Ambrosia: Kind of a big brother version of the remote control or RC aircraft that are flown by clubs throughout America.
JB: That was Vince Ambrosia, the principal investigator for the UAV project at NASA’s Ames Research Center. He said that UAVs are ideal for missions, like flying over wildfires, where it would be too risky to send a pilot.
Vince Ambrosia: Their major advantages are the capability to fly what we call the “3D” missions – the dull, dark and dangerous missions. In our cases for Earth sciences, that would be flying hurricane events, wildfire events, where you’re flying through smoke plumes – situations where you don’t want to put a pilot at risk.
DB: The unmannned aerial vehicles that Ambrosia’s team is using are equipped with cameras and thermal imaging technologies that can monitor and map wildfires in real time. This information could be used to protect the safety of firefighters on the ground and help logistics managers at command centers, some distance away from the fire, determine where to position equipment.
JB: You can visit us on the web at earthsky.org. Our thanks today to NASA’s Aeronautics Research Mission. We’re Block and Byrd for Earth & Sky.
Learn more about UAVs at NASA’s Unmanned Aerial Vehicles Web Site.
Our thanks to:
Vince Ambrosia
Senior Research Scientist
Earth Systems Science Division
NASA Ames Research Center
Additional Teacher Resources
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