Seeing Over the Horizon Success Story
Page 2 of 5
Paradise Datacom
Introduction
Drones are an increasingly common sight in civilian life for both work and play. In a military setting, they
are crucial to keeping troops and local populations safe. In the case of natural disasters, from earthquakes,
to floods, to wild fires, they are increasingly saving lives and allowing rescue coordination that was never
possible before. However, making the best decisions in the moment depends upon having as detailed a
view as possible, in as near real-time as possible, and often with the utmost security. It also depends upon
having sensors in the right locations for as long as possible.
Very large drones have become a fixture in military operations around the world. Typically, they are very
expensive and relatively few in number. There is a trend towards use of smaller drones; these can be lower
in cost and therefore deployable in more civilian and military situations, and in greater numbers, than was
possible before. One classification system identifies dierent size classes by aircraft weight, and is illustrated
below.
Even for the largest drones, size, weight, and power (SWaP) are critical, but for smaller Group 2 & 3
platforms, the pressure is magnified. Beyond the smaller available space and smaller payload capacity,
smaller batteries mean less range unless the internal systems can be engineered to draw less power. It can
also mean less ability to communicate.
An example is shown on the next page where a small drone is being used to identify the development of a
wildfire to manage and coordinate a response. Even small consumer drones can transmit high quality video
line-of-sight, but in many situations, line of sight is not possible. For operation of small drones over-the-
horizon, links are often restricted to narrow bandwidth (kilobits per second, or kb/s), allowing control only,
with video stored on-board for download once the aircraft lands – not ideal in rapidly evolving situations.