Scott Nicholas
Sentient and the U.S. Coast Guard have tested a company-built airborne maritime search and surveillance system during a live demonstration conducted off Cape Cod in Massachusetts.
The Visual Detection and Ranging system trial aimed to highlight the system’s capacity to detect objects at a distance and was part of the Coast Guard’s assessment of small UAS technologies and sensors, Sentient said Sept. 29.
The company demonstrated ViDAR with a team from the military branch’s research and development center as well as Hood Technologies and TacAero.
“With limited size and power, small and tactical UAS are heavily constrained in what they can carry and are often therefore limited to observing what has already been found,†said Simon Olsen, director of business development, strategy and partnerships at Sentient.
Olsen added the company developed ViDAR to perform wide-area search from small/tactical drones.
ViDAR includes a high-resolution digital camera designed to continuously scan the ocean in a 18-degree arc and software that can autonomously detect objects on the ocean’s surface as well as transmit image and location coordinate of each detected object to ground control terminals.
