Real Time Drone Video to Support First Responders

Kurzfassung

In times of crisis, real-time information regarding the disaster area is crucial for situation awareness and decision-making during first response missions. The use of drones equipped with sensors (i.e. optical and/or infrared cameras) can significantly increase the situation awareness of operators in a dedicated command and control (C2) centre or of first responder units on ground. To optimise the use of the drone and the video footage, three different aspects have to be considered. These are: 1) drone control, 2) camera control and 3) video data distribution. In this paper, a system architecture is presented that allows real-time video transmission from a drone as well as the control of the camera and the drone via mobile internet. The results from flight trials are presented where the drone data (video and control data) are connected to a first responder platform acting as C2 system for crisis managers. This work was carried out within the EU project IN-PREP, where multiple table-top exercises and full-scale experiments were conducted to demonstrate the benefits of a multi-actor training platform for crisis managers and practitioners.