AAD 2018 (See Event Calendar) presently going on in Johannesburg South Africa. ASOG members Luthando Prinsloo (L) and George De Cock (R) with Adeel Carelse (soon-to-be-ASOG member!)
ASOG Desk Editor's Posts (393)
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Thank you Richard Glyn-Jones for highlighting this White Paper. BREAK, BREAK If you have any questions, just reachout to Richard...you can find him in the members area.
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Technology brings high-end SAR to the civil world
Smaller, lighter advanced SAR equipment is putting high-end capability in the hands of civil operators.
(Source - http://www.sentientvision.com/2017/10/20/technology-brings-high-end-sar-civil-world/)
Nowhere has the relentless march of technology and development been more prevalent than in the field of airborne search and rescue.
Advances in sensors, cameras, data transmission technology, navigation systems and airframe design, to say nothing of the rise of unmanned aerial systems, have transformed a task that by sheer cost and logistics was originally the preserve of government and military agencies alone.
Freed from the belt-and-braces survivability requirements of military users, civil electro-optical and infrared sensors, radars and communications products have become lighter, smaller and easier to integrate. Interface and usability advances mean a single operator can perform roles that previously required several, and single and twin-engine aircraft and helicopters now have capability previously only found in large, heavy and complex military platforms.
Such is the availability of these technologies on the civil market that defence forces around the world are relinquishing their civil search and rescue roles to contracted civil operators. These operators are often proving they can do it more cheaply and in some cases better, with a culture and concept of operations geared directly to the civil surveillance and rescue tasks that make up the bulk of any national program.
In many cases advances have been aimed at improving performance of traditional systems such as radar and infrared. But some innovators have turned traditional doctrine on its head, repurposing existing technologies in ground breaking new roles.
Australia’s Sentient Vision Systems has turned airframe mounted digital cameras in to “optical radar”, offering the “track while scan”, wide area surveillance capability and interrogation functions of traditional radar from an optical system that emits no energy, minimises data transmission requirements to ground stations and uses a simple graphical interface that also allows users to slave an aircraft’s primary sensor to any desired contact with the click of a mouse.
ViDAR uses airframe-mounted single or multiple 9-megapixel cameras, which scan the ocean’s surface in a 180-degree arc from any UAS, helicopter or aircraft, imaging a swathe of ocean up to 20 nautical miles wide. Its onboard software autonomously detects any object on the surface of the ocean, flags it on the sensor operator’s screen, and captures and displays a digital still image.
Operators simply watch the passing ant trail of images across their screen to see what the aircraft is detecting in its assigned surveillance area. With a mouse click they can cross-cue the aircraft’s primary sensor, such as an infra-red or daylight TV camera turret, to investigate the contact. ViDAR’s onboard processing system ensures only detected targets are transmitted for analysis, dramatically reducing bandwidth requirements.
In US Coastguard trials ViDAR identified small boats at a range of 17.7 nautical miles, a life raft at 3.7 nautical miles and a mannequin representing a person in the water at 1.5 nautical miles. In trials on small unmanned aerial systems, ViDAR demonstrated that it could search an area 80 times the size of a standard UAS in a single sortie.
ViDAR is already in service aboard the Australian Maritime Safety Authority’s four highly modified Challenger 604 search and rescue aircraft, and with the Royal Australian Navy on Boeing’s Insitu ScanEagle unmanned aerial system and has been demonstrated with the US Coast Guard, EMSA and the UK Unmanned Warrior exercise.
For Simon Olsen, Sentient Vision’s Director of Business Development, Strategy and Partnerships, ViDAR has the power to ease the workload of search and rescue operators, mitigate sensor operator fatigue on long sorties, and give operators a greater choice of airframes capable of performing the task at hand.
“At the tactical level ViDAR reduces the workload for search and rescue operators and increases the probability of a successful contact, particularly on long and intense sorties,” he said. “Its ability to detect and display objects in the water that may not be readily visible to the human eye reduces a sensor operator’s workload, allowing them more mental acuity to manage the mission and maintain situational awareness.
“But at the strategic level ViDAR has the power to change acquisition decisions in hardware and aircraft, to change capability mixes,” he said. “Offshore patrol vessels previously dependent on shore-based aerial surveillance can now deploy their own. What could previously only be accomplished with a manned aircraft can now be accomplished with a tactical unmanned aerial system, and missions that previously needed large aircraft can now be accomplished with smaller, more cost-effective airframes or helicopters.
“ViDAR brings wide area maritime surveillance and detection within the reach of operators for whom this type of capability was previously outside the realms of technical possibility. It combines the most effective capabilities of both radar and optical sensors, without the limitations of either.”
Contact:
Sentient Vision Systems
Stewart Day
General Manager
T +61 3 9646 3331
E marketing@sentientvision.com
Besides Law Enforcement aircrews flying over major urbans areas, here’s another group doing almost the same thing but with a different focal point. This article from Rotorcraft Pro and written by Larry K. Clark is a very good and informative post on the aerial news & broadcasting profession.
Life of a News Helicopter Pilot
ASOG Desk Editor
(Image: Wikimedia commons - Peter Clarke)
Yes, I’ve thought of it many times, but, I never really drilled down to some of the details related to this topic. If you’re interested, read this white paper from the Air Line Pilots Association International (ALPA). Maybe its just me, but the key words “Airlines” and “Pilots” can be interchanged with “Aerial Work” and “Aircrew”…..cybersecurity has no borders or discriminate between crew positions in an aircraft or on an RPA crew…we’re all pretty much working with some kind of remote and connected Gizmo! ...What do you think? ASOG Desk Editor (Patrick)
Are you ready to fly? Are you and your fellow crewmembers fit to fly? Is everyone on the crew current on their training? What is the status of your aircraft and mission systems? How is the weather? Etc.
If you’re a new Airborne Sensor Operator or an ASO as a secondary profession (scientist, photopgrapher, forester, etc.) and have not been exposed to some of the aviation safety tools out there, Part 1, 2 and 3 videos will help you get started, i.e., hopefully get you, your crewmembers and flight organization ready to fly! Also, if you feel like you’re Just-Winging-It when it comes to the flight environment you participate in (organization, crewmembers, etc.), take extra notes!
O’, I don’t want to be over dramatic, but flying can get out-of-hand quickly. This video makes that point, especially at low-level. Think Safety!
O.K., now that you got a view of how things can go wrong during flight ops. The following video highlights a very effective aviation safety program that should mitigate flight departments or small flight operations from Just-Winging-It!
Drilling down further, the following video shows an aviation safety program that focuses on human factors, i.e., how to manage the “Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde” in all of us.
Posting by: Luke Aspinall (ASOG Member)
Heliwest has a Turn-Key Specialist Intelligence Gathering System available for sale or lease. The system is currently fitted to a Bo105 LS Helicopter and is also compatible with the EC135, Bell 206L or Bell 407 if required. Please note that the system is controlled under ITAR and a US DDTC Export Approval is required.
System Specifications:
MX-15 HDi
The MX-15 is fitted with HD-EOW, SDIR, LRF and Image Blending, has been maintained under a Wescam Service Plan since delivery in 2012 and has a current service plan with Wescam that expires in April 2019.
2 Position Operator Console
The 2 Position Operator Console is suitable for the Bo105 or EC135 type Helicopters and features:
• Two 17 inch Daybrite High Definition Displays with multiple HD-SDI and HDMI inputs.
• Wireless Video Dissemination in Cabin (delivering video to personal smart devices)
• Rugged i7/8GB Fanless PC
• Rugged low latency IP Video Encoder
• Integrated USB power and High-Speed Data transfer for mission data upload/download
• Combined power distribution & aircraft load shed protection
• SSD Production Grade Video Recording
a single position operator console for Bell 206L or Bell 407 is also available, fitted to a rearward facing seat track in the rear cabin.
Downlink System:
A fully integrated Video Downlink system is available, the system has a demonstrated L.O.S range out to 200 Km from the fixed receive site, and also includes a portable pelican case deployable receive system to further extend range.
If you would like more information, please contact Luke via ASOG e-mail or the following:
Manager, Special Operations | HeliwestGroup
+61 488 915 992
Big Thanks to Gary Micklethwaite for sharing this video. Its one of the best video’s highlighting what our profession is about, especially on the defense & security side of our community.
This week’s theme is ride along with an Airborne Sensor Operator (ASO) – Aerial Photographer and Cinematographer. If you’ve ever been interested in this type of ASO work, check out the collection of videos posted here (Part 1 thru 3). Overall, the presenters provide a good overview of airmanship, safety and the science & art of getting the right picture! ASOG
If you want an audio definition of our profession, i.e., Airborne Sensor Operator, check this out! Also, you can find the printed version on our webpage and on Wikipedia.
The problem facing many strategic, high growth markets that leverage real time video is no optical system or camera is optimized to deliver high-quality actionable video in every environmental condition. There are many applications that can benefit from Instant Visual Clarity in compromised video streams including: Security & Surveillance, Artificial Intelligence, Computer and Machine Vision, Autonomous Vehicles, Urban Traffic Monitoring, Smart Cities and Video Analytics. The quality of the video captured from all optical systems is compromised by a variety of factors. Even the most advanced wide-dynamic range, highdefinition, thermal or infrared cameras are restricted by optical physics and environmental challenges. The following conditions have the most significant effects on capturing high quality, actionable video:
Adverse Lighting caused by night, low light, backlight and extreme contrast like sun glare, headlights and infrared imaging are challenging environments that distress the quality of video. These conditions significantly impact the image quality taken by all camera systems, rendering them ineffective and incapable of delivering meaningful and actionable video.
Extreme Weather conditions impact the visibility of all camera systems. The image quality from cameras operated outdoors can be severely compromised by the effects of severe rain, snow, dense fog, mist or haze removing any chance of capturing actionable data.
Airborne Particles in the environment can also negatively impact the quality of the imagery delivered by the camera. Representative challenges in this area include the impact of sandstorms, smoke, smog, dirt and dust, all of which degrade visibility and the camera’s ability to capture quality video.
The demand for Instant Visual Clarity is rapidly increasing throughout global markets. Realtime, actionable video requirements are expanding across all industries including: Government, Military, Law Enforcement, Healthcare, Maritime, Industrial, Transportation, Agriculture, Retail, Energy and Public Utilities.
Governments and industries are committing significant additional resources to Security & Surveillance. Governments across the world are investing in high quality Video Surveillance Systems as part of their border control, security and anti-terrorism infrastructure. All Security & Surveillance applications can instantly benefit from instantaneous visual clarity.
Artificial Intelligence (AI) is intelligence demonstrated by machines: any device that perceives its environment and takes action that maximizes its chance of successfully attaining its goal. AI problems include reasoning, planning, learning, perception, and the ability to move and manipulate objects. For example, Artificial Intelligence enables autonomous planning or calculations for robotic systems to maneuver through an environment. Information about the environment is being provided by computer vision systems, acting as a vision sensor for the robot. Computer Vision addresses how computers can be utilized to derive a high-level understanding (from digital images or video) to automate tasks and enhance the performance of the organic, human visual system and analytical process. Computer Vision is concerned with the theory behind artificial systems that extract information from images. Computer vision systems leveraging ProHawk can extract substantially better data for scene reconstruction, event detection, video tracking, object recognition, 3D pose estimation, learning, indexing and motion estimation. The growth of the market is mainly driven by the increasing adoption of computer vision in autonomous and semiautonomous vehicles, military, industrial and consumer drones; and the rising adoption of Industry 4.0 manufacturing automation and data exchange.
Autonomous vehicles employ embedded software, sensors, and communications systems trending towards advanced Artificial Intelligence (AI) technology. True level 5 autonomous driving, full autonomy in any and all conditions, will not be achieved without ProHawk technology. Elon Musk, CEO of a leading autonomous vehicle company, Tesla, has said publicly, “Once you solve cameras for vision, autonomy is solved: if you don’t solve vision, it’s not solved…You can absolutely be superhuman with cameras.”
Successful implementation of smart city projects heavily depends on technologies – data communications, cloud, mobility, and sensors that seamlessly tie together to form an IoT ecosystem. Typical smart city projects target traffic flow optimization, public safety violence eradication, efficient street light utilization, and parking. Smart cities are enabled by smart cameras that will make sense of what they see in real time.
Governments, industries, commercial organizations all use advanced video analytics for security and to improve operational efficiency. Instant Visual Clarity is essential to key, common video analytics uses including License Plate Recognition, Object Recognition and Facial Recognition.
About the Author: Bob Brown is CEO and CTO of Prohawk Technology Group, the leading provider of Instant Visual Clarity solutions. Bob has over 30 years of experience in software and systems; he has an extensive background in storage management, network management, internet collaboration, telecommunications, and computer vision. www.prohawkgroup.com
Shared by: ASOG Member Mike Coppage
One of ASOG’s goals is to look forward into the future, i.e., professional ASOs tracking and being informed of the next tech changes. With that, is “Blockchain” going to be a major player in the future for Airborne Sensor Operators, i.e., from an aviation, systems and data management perspective?
Like me, if you’re interested to know more, I found these articles to help me understand this new technology and how it might affect my professional ASO future. What do you think…Blockchain or Blockhead technology?
Disrupting aviation with Blockchain
ASOG Desk Editor (Patrick)
(Image: Wikimedia commons - Toni Lozano)
One of our members, Mike Coppage who works for ProHawk Group at the Kennedy Space Center shared what their group is currently working on. If you’re interested or want to stay informed of current technology related to our profession, click the link (ProHawk Group) or reachout to Mike. Also, big thanks to Mike, ProHawk Group just became an ASOG Supporter.
As many of you know, fire season is in full swing in the Northern Hemisphere with devastating effect and will start up in the Southern Hemisphere soon. With that, I want to highlight how the Airborne Sensor Operator participates in this very important public safety operation.
Historically and currently, the backbone of aircrew members getting the job done is the pilot career field (both fixed wing and rotor). However, as most of us know, with the advent of new technology in our industry, more and more sensors, different type of aerial platforms, mission management systems, etc. are being employed. Along with that, ASOs are slowly becoming an important part of this industry sector.
One area of the Aerial Fire Fighting operation that requires ASO expertise is “Reconnaissance or Patrol Flights.” According to “Interagency Standards for Fire and Fire Aviation Operations” (Department of the Interior Bureau of Land Management National Park Service U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Bureau of Indian Affairs, Department of Agriculture Forest Service, 2017)
“The purpose of aerial reconnaissance or detection flights is to locate and relay
fire information to fire management. In addition to detecting, mapping, and
sizing up new fires, this resource may be utilized to provide ground resources
with intelligence on fire behavior, provide recommendations to the IC when
appropriate, and describe access routes into and out of fire areas for responding
units. Only qualified Aerial Supervisors (ATGS, ASM, HLCO and Lead/ATCO)
are authorized to coordinate incident airspace operations and give direction to
aviation assets. Flights with a “Recon, Detection, or Patrol” designation should
communicate with tactical aircraft only to announce the location, altitude and to
relay their departure direction and altitude from the incident.”
An example of this type of mission and capability is the Colorado State PC-12 Multi Mission Aircraft. Click on the hyper link below and get a commander brief of this Capability and its role in Aerial Fire Fighting.
Colorado Multi Mission Aircraft & CO-WIMS
Again, I just wanted to highlight or share how our profession is becoming an important member of this critical public safety team. Part 2 and 3 of this series are just referenced information you might find interesting and informative regarding Aerial Fire Fighting.
If you’re an Aerial Fire Fighter or SME and want to share more about Aerial Fire Fighting with your fellow ASOs or future Aerial Fire Fighting candidates, please let us know your thoughts on what it is like, training requirements and the future of sensor ops, both manned and unmanned.
ASOG Desk Editor
I wish I could have been at this years Farnborough Airshow. However, it was great to see other ASOG members connect and network. Thank you, Georg, for the field report. (L to R: Marcus Gurtner, Georg De Cock, Peter Myers)
