China launched a special-use UAV, providing Internet ‘from the sky’ to people in flood areas

Tram Ho

Not a drill, this is a real event taking place in the sky of Mihe, a small town in Gongyi area, Zhengzhou, Henan province, China, which is suffering damage from a historic floods. The flood situation has affected travel, as well as information technology infrastructure, even causing many areas to cut power in a short time.

But at that time, near midnight on July 22, all the people affected by the disaster in this town suddenly received a message with the content “very sci-fi”.

“The China Emergency Management Administration will dispatch a drone to reach the sky above your town and public network communication may be temporarily restored. Due to the device’s time limit drone, public network recovery time is only 5 hours. Please report the situation and contact your family as soon as possible. Good luck!”, the text of the message said.

Trung Quốc phóng UAV đặc dụng, cung cấp Internet từ trên trời cho người dân vùng lũ - Ảnh 1.

Pterosaur-2H UAV.

That night, a drone named Pterosaur-2H made an emergency take off from Guizhou airport. After a 4.5-hour flight, it reached the area of ​​communication interruption in Mihe town and, as promised, continuously provided people with a stable signal for 5 hours that day.

This is the first time the Pterosaur-2H UAV has appeared to the public and is the first practical application of dual-use UAVs, both for civilian and military purposes, deployed in the face of disasters.

Although the recovery time for communications is only 5 hours, it is enough for many people in the disaster area to transmit contact information, report peace, call for help, etc. normally, under extraordinary circumstances.

Immediately, the event attracted the attention of many netizens in this country, with comments and reviews that brought excitement and pride. According to the feedback of netizens in the supported area, the signal from this UAV is quite stable and uninterrupted. Real-time communication speed is also very good and testing shows that even residents can make video calls.

Trung Quốc phóng UAV đặc dụng, cung cấp Internet từ trên trời cho người dân vùng lũ - Ảnh 2.

Experiment with video calling from “the Internet in the sky”

Pterosaur’s precise classification is a family of versatile, long-lived UAVs at mid to low altitudes. The first version Pterosaur-1 was launched in 2007 and started mass production in 2011. Compared to the previous version, Pterosaur-2 has expanded the body and optimized the aerodynamic layout, system The propulsion system has also received many improvements. It has also received orders in the Middle East and Africa.

This Chinese Pterosaur UAV series is even compared to the MQ-9 Raptor commonly used in the US. Because they are all drones with integrated reconnaissance and attack at low and medium altitudes. In theory, the Pterosaur-2 has a battery life of 20 hours. However, uptime can vary, depending on deployment and the payloads carried, depending on the mission.

Trung Quốc phóng UAV đặc dụng, cung cấp Internet từ trên trời cho người dân vùng lũ - Ảnh 3.

Pterodactyl-1 version at the 2015 military parade in China.

Specifically in this deployment, the Pterosaur-2H UAV has 4 important components to perform emergency communication missions, which are composite aperture radar, satellite antenna, photoelectric pod and support pod. emergency contact. In which, the most important are the synthetic aperture radar for optical imaging in extremely low visibility weather conditions and the optoelectronic pod for detecting, searching and tracking targets. The two will work together to send images of the disaster area to headquarters in real time, which is extremely beneficial for the rescue work below.

The satellite antenna is used to receive signals from the satellite, and the emergency communications support pod allows it to act as the equivalent of an “airborne wireless base station”, performing communications relay tasks, allowing residents in disaster areas to easily connect to China Mobile’s core infrastructure network.

Trung Quốc phóng UAV đặc dụng, cung cấp Internet từ trên trời cho người dân vùng lũ - Ảnh 4.

The UAV also transfers real-time images of the area to the base to assist in rescue operations.

During the last deployment in Mihe, Pterosaur-2H was deployed from an airport 4.5 hours away, while carrying specialized equipment to be able to deploy the Internet, so the operation time was only ah 5 hours. Chinese authorities said that in the near future, if deployed in a closer area, with the support of manufacturers such as Huawei or ZTE, the broadcast time will be even longer. In addition, this deployment is also experimental, the level of network transmission of 5 hours is also considered “enough for people in disaster areas”.

After providing the information network and the Internet in Mihe, Pterosaur-2H returned to its base in Guizhou Province, recharged its batteries, and once again set off to provide the Internet for the rescue work of the Heart Hospital in Zhengzhou city.

Trung Quốc phóng UAV đặc dụng, cung cấp Internet từ trên trời cho người dân vùng lũ - Ảnh 5.

Pterodactyl-2H is a dual-use UAV, used in both military and civilian applications.

In fact, many large corporations in the world have also tried to develop similar projects, but failed.

To carry out its plan to connect globally, Facebook designed a drone called Aquila in 2016, which aims to become an “air base station” that provides high-altitude wireless networks. But during a test flight, Aquila crashed due to structural failure. Although the subsequent landing was successful, Facebook abandoned the project in 2018.

Google also acquired a startup called “Titan Aerospace” in 2014. Its core project is to use high-altitude flying drones to provide Internet access services to users. remote areas on earth, while using solar energy to keep the device running. But now, Google has also abandoned this project, the reason given is that the project encountered “technical obstacles”.

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Source : Genk