BVLOS Aerial Robotics

This project seeks to significantly reduce costs, and improve the safety of rail staff by automating inspections, surveys, and response to incidents, avoiding the need for people to physically set foot on the railway infrastructure. Recognising that Network Rail and its suppliers currently access the rail infrastructure many thousands of times per year to inspect, survey, and examine the network to make asset management and maintenance planning decisions, as well as to get 'eyes on' in the event of an incident, we have sought to demonstrate how this can be done through the use of an automated long range aerial drone system. The benefits of this system include estimated savings of circa £1bn per control period, as well as the elimination of millions of pairs of 'boots on ballast'. This project will demonstrate a comprehensive and flexible automated Beyond Visual Line Of Sight [BVLOS] drone system capable of delivering safety and condition surveys, inspections, and examinations remotely from the air rather than from the trackside or from a helicopter. This is a first of a kind capability as current drone technology can only operate Within Visual Line Of Sight [WVLOS] and requires the placement of multiple ground markers to achieve even a coarse level of accuracy. This existing WVLOS approach offers none of the benefits of the proposed project; indeed it is generally recognised to cost far more than conventional methodology. Capability demonstrated by this project will include a novel BVLOS drone and BVLOS ground control station solution for automated flight path planning and operation, able to undertake both long range and local inspections using a unique hybrid drone design, that can deliver up to 6 times the range and endurance of equivalent multirotor drones. Targeted payloads include gimballed HD EO & IR cameras, LiDAR and 100MP camera. Within this programme we will demonstrate how this system can bring a new approach to BVLOS regulatory approvals and flight management, achieved using a high-fidelity 3D visualisation environment that will provide the framework for both Network Rail internal and CAA external BVLOS regulatory approvals.