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Comment by jabretti | Hacker News Reader

It seems to me more like they're just trying to build firefighting drones.

It's not clear to me that they have any actual insight into how said drones might help, or how firefighting is done at the moment.

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Surely it's simply a question of putting fire on the blockchain?

I volunteered for a search and rescue organization for awhile. There was some interest in drones simply to get overhead video of a collapsed building etc. Currently you are limited to walking over the rubble. If you could have a drone fly overhead and identify victims or unsafe areas, it could really help.

Something on the scale of the Raven UAV would make sense for that application:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AeroVironment_RQ-11_Raven

Those big super tankers operate at like $1m a day.. drones seem like they would be mosquitos in comparison. Maybe useful for spotting fires but I think satellite are the best plus traditional look outs. AI for sat images to spot wildfires is probably already done. It could track storms (lightning etc..). A bigger issue for wildfires is removing fuel sources which nobody does. A wet winter and spring fuels fire season.

Improving fire code is more likely to have a bigger impact. This is basically all about money though.

Airborne drones can't carry enough water to be useful for extinguishment, but land-based drones could, and a swarm of mini-bulldozers to clear a fireline would be even better. Getting them to work reliably in rough terrain with lots of vegetation would be a big challenge though.

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