The body of 22-year-old Lefei Huang was recovered Sunday night in the Mount Baldy area of the San Gabriel Mountains, ending a week-long search after she went missing during a solo hike amid heavy snowfall.
The article mentioned that someone spotted her with a (I assume commercial) drone. This makes me wonder if future search and rescue operations could include an array of drones flying in a wide formation, sweeping across a large grid. They could even have thermal imaging cameras on board, which in winter weather should be magnitudes more helpful.
If something like this technique has been employed already I would love to read about it. Not sure I’ve heard of it before.
Thank goodness normal drones are banned. They can be so annoying when you’re trying to be in nature, and you’re inflicting your hobby and noise on everyone in a huge area. It’s like people who bring a speaker to broadcast their shitty music, only on a much larger scale. Good riddance.
I think it would have to be be a rescue drone anyway - I bet thermal imaging would be a huge benefit, any time it’s night or cold. Do consumer drones have thermal?
Actually, this is where we need military technology. Imagine a full sized drone taking off from a few central bases, able to fly search grids independently for an entire day, and recognize humans to rescue. You just have to remember to replace that Ninja Missile with a survival kit that can be dropped near a survivor
I can see their reasoning for it. Lithium Ion batteries inherently carry a fire risk, I’ve always heard. So unless they made the batteries bulletproof it’s possible a fall could end up puncturing/cracking one and starting a wildfire. Didn’t consider this until you mentioned the bans. 👍
These replies are a bit amusing considering the post here yesterday about all the target shooting that’s (legally) done in these same wilderness areas which means igniting gun powder and lots of loud bangs (along with the trash and danger to nearby individuals).
The article mentioned that someone spotted her with a (I assume commercial) drone. This makes me wonder if future search and rescue operations could include an array of drones flying in a wide formation, sweeping across a large grid. They could even have thermal imaging cameras on board, which in winter weather should be magnitudes more helpful.
If something like this technique has been employed already I would love to read about it. Not sure I’ve heard of it before.
Oddly enough, drones are banned in national parks so that might create some hurdles for using them in search and rescue.
Thank goodness normal drones are banned. They can be so annoying when you’re trying to be in nature, and you’re inflicting your hobby and noise on everyone in a huge area. It’s like people who bring a speaker to broadcast their shitty music, only on a much larger scale. Good riddance.
I think it would have to be be a rescue drone anyway - I bet thermal imaging would be a huge benefit, any time it’s night or cold. Do consumer drones have thermal?
Actually, this is where we need military technology. Imagine a full sized drone taking off from a few central bases, able to fly search grids independently for an entire day, and recognize humans to rescue. You just have to remember to replace that Ninja Missile with a survival kit that can be dropped near a survivor
I can see their reasoning for it. Lithium Ion batteries inherently carry a fire risk, I’ve always heard. So unless they made the batteries bulletproof it’s possible a fall could end up puncturing/cracking one and starting a wildfire. Didn’t consider this until you mentioned the bans. 👍
These replies are a bit amusing considering the post here yesterday about all the target shooting that’s (legally) done in these same wilderness areas which means igniting gun powder and lots of loud bangs (along with the trash and danger to nearby individuals).
I think rescue drone should be fine