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The purpose of the handbook below is to promote the safe, coordinated and effective use of UAVs in a wide range of humanitarian settings. The handbook draws on lessons learned during recent humanitarian UAV missions in Vanuatu (March-April 2015) and Nepal (April-May 2015) as well as earlier UAV missions in both Haiti and the Philippines.

I wrote this handbook for the following reasons: UAV/Drone experts who engage in relief efforts without prior experience in this domain often assume that they know everything because, heck, they are the experts when it comes to this new technology. Likewise, although to a lesser extent, disaster response groups think they are the experts when it comes to Humanitarian UAV/Drone Missions since, heck, they've been doing disaster response longer than anyone else. These kinds of assumptions backfired big time in response to the Nepal Earthquake. The purpose of this handbook is to educate and raise awareness in order to prevent the circus act we saw in Nepal.

The handbook takes the form of an operational checklist divided into Pre-flight, In-flight and Post-flight sections. The best practices documented in each section are meant to serve as a minimum set of guidelines only. As such, this document is not the final word on best practices, which explains why the handbook is available here as an open, editable Google Doc. We invite humanitarian, UAV and research communities to improve this handbook and to keep our collective best practices current by inserting key comments and suggestions directly to the Google Doc. Both hardcopies and digital copies of this handbook are available for free and may not in part or in whole be used for commercial purposes. 

Click here for more information on the Humanitarian UAV Network.

Remember the first version of the Quanum Goggles (see blog post here)? they were quit popular and now they are even better, according to HobbyKing.

This new version features a 5” TFT monitor with 3X-magnifying lens and a 800 x 480 super pixel display. In addition, the screen does not turn blue when signal is getting weak or lost and this is must have feature for FPV.

Other changes are a better fit to your face contour, pockets for Head Tracker, switcher, FPV receiver and small Lipo pack.

More details at the HobbyKing website: http://www.hobbyking.com/hobbyking/store/uh_viewitem.asp?idproduct=78125&aff=5361

Hello DIY Drones Universe,

Last week we announced that we are searching for 20 Beta Testers for our NEW Drone Recovery Parachute System (Link to Beta Testers Blog Post). We've received a few dozen emails from folks interested in becoming a Beta Tester of our Products. It wasn't until a few days after this "Call Out" for Beta Testers that we learned about the existence of an experimental parachute feature on the Pixhawk for Copter 3.2 and later (http://copter.ardupilot.com/wiki/common-optional-hardware/parachute/). With that new discovery things from our previous blog have changed!

Some things from our previous "Call Out" for Beta Testers blog on here have been removed and some added. Things in GREEN have been added to the "Call Out" and things crossed out in RED have been removed.

Hello Diy Drones Universe,

Here at CAD Drones LLC we are currently looking for 20 Beta Testers of the Drone Parachute System we are now currently selling. To get this affordable product to the Drone Industry we have to have video from people sharing their success with our product! Currently we have only a small number of customers all of which have had great success but many of which are very busy or do work with systems/companies that they are not allowed to share information/results of our product to the public. We are not able to offer the Beta Testers free products but we are fully willing to offer 25% - 40% OFF our already extremely affordable products to the Beta Testers. All we ask in return from the Beta Testers is:

• Assist us in finishing the experimental Parachute Feature on the Pixhawk for Copter 3.2 and later 

• It's preferred but not necessary that you own and have experience with or are currently a Dev for the Pixhawk System

• Have an extreme passion and love for Drones/UAVs and the growth of the industry
• Own either a Quadcopter, Fixed Wing Plane, R/C Model Aircraft, or an R/C Watercraft
• Share blogs on our dedicated Drone Parachute Forum on CADDrones.com
• In these blogs please share your results, tips, personal opinion on the product, any possible improvements you would suggest, and anything else that will help show our customers that these products work at an affordable price
• Video's documentation of your test, results, and tips is essential to help get this off the ground so if your able to please create videos for your blog posts on our dedicated forum

If interested please contact me at: JoshuaAllenJohnson@gmail.com or fill out our "Contact Us" Form on our store page!

       Another reminder of the dangers of using drones  by air brained guy like the above. This time flying a machine in close proximity and unprotected blades. He is lucky it didn't slice his fingers off!

http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2015/may/31/enrique-iglesias-drone-tijuana-concert

"Watching Saturday’s events unfold, Jones said he knew the job must have cost City Light “quite a bit of money” because there were eight line workers and a fleet of trucks and service vehicles. But when he asked workers what it was costing, he didn’t expect $35,000.

“That is a staggering sum of money — all for the benefit of the liberty to fly some toy around in an environment where it doesn’t belong,” he said."

Full story by the Seattle Times here.

From Bloomberg:

The unmanned Solara 50 fell to the ground shortly after takeoff on May 1 and the U.S. National Transportation Safety Board is investigating, Keith Holloway, an agency spokesman, said in an interview. The accident occurred at a private airstrip east of Albuquerque and no one was injured, he said.
The crash is a setback for Google’s high-altitude vision of how to bring Internet access to areas of the world without sufficient infrastructure on the ground. Titan Aerospace, the company Google bought last year for undisclosed terms, built the drone, which its promotional material says has a wingspan of 50 meters (164 feet). It is supposed to fly above the weather, where it could then beam Internet signals to earth as if it was a satellite.

In under a year, the team of flight enthusiasts at Bay Zoltan Nonprofit Ltd., a state-owned applied research institute in Hungary, has taken the concept of a personal flight tricopter from the drawing board to its first manned flight at Miskolc Airfield in northeast Hungary on March 7.

On the manned flight, the Flike (think fly-bike) concept demonstrator had a takeoff weight of 210 kg (463 lb) and only made it off the ground for a few seconds, but took off and landed safely. In a subsequent manned test flight, the Flike fly meters off the ground, and was able to demonstrate hovering and maneuvering capabilities while compensating for wind in a controlled flight lasting one and a half minutes.

Source: Gizmag

Not much info yet but at least we know the launch date:

Woodman also revealed the company is working on a quadcopter — or drone, as they’re more commonly known. He declined to share any details about its design and pricing, but it’s slated to launch in the first half of 2016 and will be aimed at consumers. 

“It’s incredible to see our world from new perspectives. It’s a real ‘Oh my God’ moment,” said Woodman. “We did that with our GoPro cameras, and we see a similar opportunity in the quadcopter market. It’s something that’s in our DNA, and we are excited about it across the company.”

Though it’s working on its own hardware, GoPro plans to continue working with other drone manufacturers to provide cameras and software solutions for aerial video and photography.

“We recognize that consumers want choice,” said Woodman. “Our primary focus is enabling great content, and however they want to do that, we’re excited to be part of that.”

Woodman also announced virtual reality accessory:

The first is the Six-Camera Spherical Array. The ball-shaped accessory mount can accommodate six Hero4 cameras positioned in different directions to capture high-resolution images and video for virtual reality. The recorded video and pictures can then be stitched together using Kolor, the virtual reality software company GoPro acquired in April, to create one unified 6K spherical image.

The resulting video can be viewed on VR headsets like Oculus, Google Cardboard and Microsoft HoloLens. It can also be viewed on your smartphone or PC using the Kolor app or YouTube 360. If viewing on a mobile device, you can physically turn around to look in any direction — up, down, left, right. On your computer’s browser, you can use your cursor to get different views. Here’s an example video GoPro shot for the Code Conference.

more:

http://recode.net/2015/05/27/gopros-next-adventure-virtual-reality-drones/

Every year famed Kleiner Perkins venture capitalist Mary Meeker gives a "State of the Internet" presentation, which highlights stats and analysis on what she considers the most important technology trends of the year. This year, drones figured prominently. Here are her slides, with great data as always:

We're not quite halfway through our campaign, and we are absolutely delighted by the enthusiasm Sprite is getting!  Thank you to ALL of you for your interest and support!

Today we're introducing a new Reward, the Sprite Payload Developer Kit, to make it easier for everyone to make Sprite do what you want it to do...whatever that is.  Want to make a grappling hook?  Do it.  A cellular network relay?  Knock yourself out.  An emergency locator transmitter?  Do it.

This package will include all of the digital files you'll need to design and print a custom bulkhead.   It will attach to the bottom of Sprite's Main Module, interface with other modules like the optional Light Ring and LaunchPod landing gear, and provide a watertight seal to keep things dry inside.  There's also an accommodation for power and data connections, and once performance testing is complete on Sprite, we'll include weight and final dimensional limitations.

So what will it cost?  Not much.

All current and future backers will receive the PDK as part of their existing pledge.  There's no need to do anything else.  Backed us with a Sprite Explorer commitment?  You'll get the PDK.  In line for a tee shirt?  You'll get the PDK also.  Donate a buck?  Yep, you get the PDK, too.  If you haven't donated yet, we're creating a new Reward that will allow you to select the PDK separately.  It's going to have a Reward level of $25.  Now you're probably thinking...well, if I can get the PDK for a "No Reward" donation of $1, why would I select the $25 PDK Reward?  Well, just because.  You don't have to.  But every little bit will help us bring Sprite to life that much faster, and that much better.

Anything else?

Any development done with the PDK needs to be done under a non-commercial, open source license.  We'll ask you to post your designs to Ascent's website for distribution to other members of the Sprite community to use.

THANK YOU for your support so far, and please keep the questions and comments coming!

New startup funds SkyFund and Commercial Drone Fund are launching to help advance businesses seeking to develop in the commercial drone space, from hardware to data services.  

You can read more about it here:

http://www.forbes.com/sites/ryanmac/2015/05/27/accel-partners-dji-skyfund-drone-investments/

And here:

http://techcrunch.com/2015/05/27/drone-fund/

Remember back, way back in autopilot years probably about 20. The year 2009 and the first round of our gentlemens (ladies are allowed just none have ever entered) competition the T3 challenge.

Back then just flying way points was hard and all this gear was expensive. Ardupilots were made at Sparkfun in batches that ran out quick.

Lets try it again I suspect this time the challenge would really be flying it faster than somebody FPV racing.

Read about the first time here for hints and tips. 

As tech has moved on all aircraft types welcome lets make it not above 50m and 5 laps. All of course autonomous. Extra marks if that is from take off to landing.I will count the time from take off to landing so screaming dives to the start will not help. KMLs as evidence please!

UPDATE: Rovers (and boats) are also allowed! There will be a special rover/boat class, and you only have to beat other vehicles in that class. The course for such ground/water vehicles is 100m x 100m. 

I will accept FPV times for the sake of science and should they be much much quicker it will give the pure FPV crowd something to brag about.

An Easystar (yes before HK copied it) made one lap in less than a minute in 2009 so 5 in 5 minutes should be more than possible. 

As ever the time frame is flexible but why don't we all meet back here on August the 1st and find out who won!

Please add your entries and adventures below. Points are always awarded for silliness, just as long as its safe!

A friend asked me if I could help him and his fellow birders of Lokkisaari ry out and take some aerial images of a bird reserve they are maintaining. Of course, I was happy to help!

Those guys are doing an amazing job in maintaining a small island in lake Ahtiala in Lempäälä. Since about 13 years now, they clean the island and keep it habitable for the birds and it has developed into a real gull paradise. It's even a nature reserve in the EU's Natura 2000 program.

I was a bit nervous flying over water, especially, as I haven't flown my IRIS that much yet and am not that familiar with it's battery endurance, so we started with a quick pass, flying out, staying for 30 seconds and flying back - or so it was planned. Of course, having not flown in a while, I forgot the right sequence of commands in the mission planning and so she went out and came back, waited 30 seconds above the landing point and landed. But I had an idea about how much battery one pass will consume and sent her out again on the same route - with a corrected flight plan. From that pass, we got a few very nice photos. After that, I sent her out again for a video pass, but just arrived at the island, she decided to return immediately and shortly after, the battery failsafe kicked in and she landed safely at the starting point.

All in all, things went well, we got nice photos and might return there tomorrow with fresh batteries - and a better idea about the battery usage of the IRIS on that route.

From Buzzfeed, an announcement of an exciting new lab that will focus on technology (including drones) and journalism. I'm one of the advisors. 

Late this summer, BuzzFeed is launching a new lab in its San Francisco office, dedicated to coming up with new tools and technologies — hardware and software — that benefit reporting and journalism, and releasing those as open source. We’re calling it the BuzzFeed Open Lab For Journalism Technology and the Arts, and it’s going to be a mind blower.

When you think about media experiments, you probably think about advertising models or paywalls or, more recently, partnerships with companies like Facebook or Snapchat. But those kind of media experiments are deeply boring to pretty much everyone who doesn’t depend on ads for a paycheck. The logic of this new lab is: screw it, let’s fly drones. Drones with lasers. And more to the point: let’s build drones with lasers and show everyone how to make them too. We want to push the envelope. We want to get just on the edge of what’s possible, and what’s permissible. We want to break shit, and build it back better than it was before. And then we want to show you how to follow along, using the very same tech we developed. Basically, we want to teach everyone to fish. But with drones.

Why we’re doing it and how it’ll work

At BuzzFeed’s core, we care about data science and technology and rethinking traditional web formats. Typically that benefits BuzzFeed and our readers. The Open Lab will be our R&D arm that allows us to extend that core value of technology to the rest of the media industry and, more importantly, to the public domain so we can help create new formats, new ideas, and new technologies, all at the service of journalism and media as a whole. And ultimately, in the service of the general public.

It was extremely important to us that the lab be open source. There are so many closed sourced labs where great ideas from smart people get smothered by the obsession of capitalizing on the idea. If we could build a new algorithm through data mining that helps journalists better report on public transit, that helps the industry as a whole. If we can build a hardware for drones that allows you to keep the data when a drone crashes or a camera that gives you a better aerial angle of a crowd, and that hardware is open source, the impact of that work is greater than if it was closed to only BuzzFeed journalists.

So here’s how it’s going to work. We’re soliciting proposals and resumes from engineers, hackers, journalists, artists — whoever, really — and we’re going to select a team of four fellows (one year) and one senior fellow (two year) to come work in our lab. We’re looking for both hardware and software proposals, and we’re open to all kinds of cutting edge areas. You could be developing new applications for drones or robots in journalism, or using novel sensors or hardware for data collection. We want people with ideas about machine learning, AI, or data science that can help us identify hidden stories and sources. Or maybe it’s an idea about how to tell a story more effectively, something related to visualization, interface, VR, or some other technology for communicating complex stories. Really, we’re open to any technology development project with the potential to advance journalistic goals, give reporters new tools, and provide news consumers with better information.

Partners and Advisory Board

To help us, we’ve partnered with GE and Eyebeam to sponsor two fellows. GE is a particularly strategic partner for us because of their expertise in hardware and the intersection of the physical and digital. Those interested in the GE Fellowship should submit proposals for project(s) related to the industrial internet of things (IoT). Projects could be related to intelligent cities and environments, connected factories, and advanced technologies that can connect machines, data and people for better outcomes. The fellow will be advised by an expert from GE Software’s Global Center in San Ramon, CA.

Our Founder and CEO Jonah Peretti was the R&D director of Eyebeam, a not-for-profit lab at the intersection of technology and art, from 2001 - 2006. When Jonah and I were dreaming up BuzzFeed’s Open Lab, we were inspired by his time at Eyebeam, where the first reblog was born and projects like Ayah Bdeir’s littleBits, openFrameworks, and other game-changers got their start, alongside internationally recognized and award-winning artists working with technology. We wanted to expand their mission and spirit of openness in igniting courageous art and technology from Brooklyn to San Francisco. We’re pumped to be partnering with them, where an Eyebeam fellow’s proposals should focus on the potential to shape the way news is created, consumed and distributed. Eyebeam will be helping us tap into their network of artists and engineers to help fill the role and its Director Roddy Schrock will be joining the advisory board.

During their year tenure at BuzzFeed, our fellows will spend time with fellows in Eyebeam’s creative studios in Brooklyn, NY and will work with GE’s team in San Ramon

In addition to GE and Eyebeam, we’ve brought on an awesome advisory team: Founder and CEO Jonah Peretti, BuzzFeed Publisher Dao Nguyen, BuzzFeed board member and a16z Partner Chris Dixon, Chris Anderson (CEO of 3D Robotics and Former WIRED EIC) and Natalie Jeremijenko (Artist and Engineer). They’ll be interacting regularly with fellows, helping them solve problems and come up with creative ideas. It’s going to be a blast.

I came to BuzzFeed largely because I wanted to be in a place that embraced experimentation, where smart people were frantically pushing the boundaries of what is possible, and what is permissible. That’s what this lab is all about. We want to embrace fearlessness and the possibility of failure. We want to jump the fence. We want to see what else is out there. And then we want to bring the world with us. Come on. Let’s go.

How to apply

Open Lab will begin our first class in late summer 2015 with 5 fellows including: 
A senior fellow who will join BuzzFeed for 2 years, advise the fellows and will work on self directed projects. Please indicate in your submission that you are applying for the senior fellowship position.

- A GE fellow will explore the industrial Internet of Things and have the opportunity to develop on Predix, GE’s Industrial Internet cloud platform. Please indicate in your submission that you are applying for the GE fellowship.
- An Eyebeam fellow will focus on creative practice in art, technology, and journalism through critical exploration, particularly engaging with privacy, ad-hoc-ness, and tracking-resistance. Please indicate in your submission that you are applying for the Eyebeam fellowship.
- Two additional fellowship spots are available for a wide range of proposals. 
- Ben Kreimer, a BuzzFeed Open Lab beta fellow, will begin June 30 focusing on drone journalism and sensors.

Please submit the following materials as attachments or links to openlabfellowship@buzzfeed.com. Applications will be considered by BuzzFeed’s editorial and tech staff, as well as the advisory board. The fellowships are full-time positions. Current and former BuzzFeed employees may apply but will not be given special preference. Applicants must be authorized to work in the United States.

Application materials

- Résumé or CV
- Details on three to five past projects you feel are representative of your best work
- If applying for the senior fellowship, please include examples of successfully leading product launches

Project(s) proposal: Please explain in detail, in separate sections:
- The specific project(s) you intend to work on with a proposed schedule.
- How the project(s) can be completed in only a year.
- If involving hardware, how the project(s) can be scaled up, including rough cost estimates.
- Why you are qualified and capable of doing work others haven’t or can’t.
- How the project(s) is consistent with the open source idea of bettering the media industry.
- Three letters of recommendation: Please have your referees email their letters directly to us at openlabfellowship@buzzfeed.com using the subject line “[Candidate’s Last Name] Reference.” Your referees should attest to your knowledge of your subject matter and your professional abilities, and your ability to create and innovate shareable technology.

FLIR just added a new imager in the line up ten times less expensive than traditional thermal cameras.

Resolution is  80 × 60 active pixels so I guess its to low res for a pilot camera at night.  At least prices are coming down

FLIR Lepton® is a revolutionary longwave infrared (LWIR) imager that is ten times less expensive than traditional thermal cameras.

With a resolution of 80 × 60 active pixels, Lepton is bringing thermal imaging to a new generation of electronic devices for work, play, and mission-critical applications.

And Lepton is available in three models: 50° FOV w/o shutter, 25° FOV w/o shutter, and 50° FOV with a shutter for manual calibration.

http://www.flir.com/cores/content/?id=66257

We're gearing up for the final avionics test flight of the Low Orbit Helium Assisted Navigator (LOHAN) project, and have dubbed the mission PRATCHETT ("Planes Reactive Airborne Tests Checking Heuristically for Extreme Technological Tantrums") in honour of the late Discworld author Sir Terry.

In October last year, our US allies at Edge Research Laboratory sent a rig comprising Pixhawk, servos and batteries - identical to that mounted in our Vulture 2 spaceplane - up to 27,700, to see how the whole thing would handle the cold.

Autopilot brain surgeons Linus Penzlien and Andrew Tridgell picked over the results and suggested a few modifications, including sticking a Zener diode across the servo power rail and activating better battery monitoring. The full findings are here.

So, we reassembled the kit and it's good to go stratowards in the next couple of weeks. On board will also be our 900Mhz radio rig, by which Tridge can monitor the Pixhawk's status in real time. Try this schematic of the full rig, and a photo of how that looks in the PRATCHETT payload box:

There are full details on PRATCHETT flight right here.

From IEEE Spectrum:

We’ve written before about theadvantages ofmulti-modal robots: by combining two different forms of locomotion in one platform, you can take advantage of (say) the efficiency and endurance of a ground robot with the range and versatility of a flying robot. However, designing one robot that can walk and fly tends to be both complicated and inefficient, which is why hetergeneous robot teams are often more appealing. Instead of trying to cram every capability into one robot, you just use several different robots with different specializations and find some way of getting them to work together. Like this robotic cockroach that can serve as an aircraft carrier for a robotic bird.

You’re looking at UC Berkeley’s VelociRoACH (not the super speedy X2 version that we also wrote about today, just the normal speedy one) giving a running start to the H2Bird ornithopter micro aerial vehicle and successfully launching it off of a carrier framework. The H2Bird (which weighs a smidge over 13 grams and can fly for a minute and a half) can’t get itself off the ground on its own; it needs to hit about 1.3 m/s with an angle of attack of between 35 and 40 degrees, all of which can be provided by the carrier structure on top of a scurrying VelociRoACH.

The appeal of this little robotic team goes beyond the advantages of each robot operating separately, as the researchers found that there was significant benefit to the robots even when they’re attached. Obviously, hauling the H2Bird around on its back is going to make VelociRoACH less efficient, but it also improves stability, decreasing pitch and roll variances by up to 95 percent if H2Bird slowly flaps its wings (at 5 Hz) while VelociRoAch is running. At the same time, this slow flap reduces the effective weight of H2Bird, boosting VelociRoACH’s running speed by over 12 percent. There’s also an overall decrease in the cost of transport for both robots, as the researchers explain:

Placing the H2Bird on top of the VelociRoACH decreases the cost of transport of the VelociRoACH by approximately 16 percent. This decrease in the cost of transport would be useful in a situation where the VelociRoACH and the H2Bird had to both reach a point 80 meters away and the H2Bird had to fly 20 meters in the air, where the VelociRoACH cannot reach. In one case, both robots travel the 80 meters separately, and then the H2Bird continues the last 20 meters. In a second case, the VelociRoACH carries the H2Bird for the first 80 meters, then the H2Bird is launched and flies 20 meters. The second case consumes 25 percent less energy than the first. In situations such as these, cooperative locomotion would be more efficient than independent locomotion.

Right now, the launch of H2Bird off of VelociRoACH is being remote controlled by hand, so the next step is to make the launch system autonomous. We’re also hoping to see some sort of adaptation that’ll somehow allow VelociRoACH to pick H2Bird up again, enabling the team to fully leverage both aerial and ground locomotion.

“Coordinated Launching of an Ornithopter With a Hexapedal Robot,” by Cameron J. Rose, Parsa Mahmoudieh, and Ronald S. Fearing from UC Berkeley, will be presented this week at ICRA 2015 in Seattle.

It is my pleasure to inform you that the faa has authorized the 3dr aero a 333 examption for flight in the United States for My company M2 Flight Solutions which has been apart of diy drones for a very long time and now has a 333 exampation from the faa to fly it. I have seen some great ideas come to life and other stuggle. Now I am happy to add to the diy history and 3dr company of using the aero for 3d mapping missions in the state of Alaska as well as the lower 48 states. We use the plane for 3d reconstruction of lands as well as many other great projects. The nicely built aero is a great plane to fly very stable Thanks to the pix hawk auto pilot and the long flight time.

I want to thank Chris Anderson for the help he has giving to me. And for starting this site! It's a great community for knowledge. If you want to read a local article on me and my company please visit the link below and thank you again.

M2 Flight Solutions
CEO Michael Cook


http://www.suasnews.com/2015/05/36167/local-uav-company-lifts-off/

From Hackaday. Reminds me of work Harold Molle was doing five years ago here!