Comment by marklit
20 hours ago
Drones (and helicopters) do have their market as well. A lot of engineering firms I saw would go with one of these two, depending on the situation.
20 hours ago
Drones (and helicopters) do have their market as well. A lot of engineering firms I saw would go with one of these two, depending on the situation.
How many years away are we from a cheap drone that will takeoff, land, solar recharge, repeat until it returns to you a few weeks later with a few tb of SD cards of high res imagery?
Pretty close. Sesame Energy[0] make these shipping container boxes with solar panels + batteries so you can just drop them where you need no-supply chain energy. The boxes also synthesize hydrogen which can be used to power drones. The talk I heard from the CEO said the automated swapping of hydrogen canisters was not yet there, but they were working on it. Nothing in robotics is easy, but this feels like a very attainable goal that the military would pay to get working.
[0] https://www.sesame.solar/audience/us-military-allies
Autel dragonfish and hanger and you're halfway there. Will need a fat checkbook (the bird is ~$200k) and be outside of the US.
A lot of the barriers are regulatory in the Western world. In rainforests you might not have to worry about that, but there aren't many shade free spots to land