Hestia Tessera: The Fire Drone

As the global temperatures are ever-increasing, the possibility of fires becomes greater in forests and urban areas, more so in the fire prone areas. The current response time to detect and combat fires is too long, therefore, there is a need for a system that allows quick and versatile detection of said fires and help in placating human casualties in these moments.

Our idea is to create a dynamic system of interconnected drones via a cloud service to combat fires in prone areas. It is equipped with applicable sensors and utilities to analyze, detect and even suppress the fires to a certain extent.

You solution benefits the people living in fire prone areas, allowing them to form resilience. It helps in saving lives of firefighters and also saving people from places that was humanly impossible to reach. 

Surprisingly as the global climate has been increasing, we have been noticing a smaller number of overall fires. But these fires are more intense than ever before, which raise causes for worry. Due to this increased intensity of forest and urban fire, the property damage and damage to life has increased exponentially, and is projected to grow even more according to the current trend.

According to the U.S. Fire Administration, in the USA over 60 firefighters have lost their lives in fire related incidents in the year 2019 itself. While these numbers of mortality keep on rising, the damages caused by increasingly intense fires cause major economic setbacks. Compared to 14.2 billion dollars of losses in 2016, 2018 cost the US government 25.6 billion dollars in damages. That is an astounding increase of 80.2% in just 2 years. If these rates keep consistent, then global warming and fires will end up halting human development.

Lastly, there is a delay between detection of fires and the fire fighters to arrive. This delay causes causalities which could easily be negated if a better detection method is applied.

Our idea is to create a dynamic system of interconnected drones via a cloud service to combat fires in prone areas, both rural and urban. It would: 

• Create and analyze a dynamic data set of temperature variations through thermal sensors for fire-prone areas.

• Navigate these fire-prone areas for any signs of fire ignition, and send such activities to the command center for further evaluation. 

• Calculate the amount of water needed and provide it in key areas that may be out of human reach.

• Report to the authority about people in perilous conditions and also act as rescue machinery for them. 

• Equipped with solar panels to store power for prolonged usage and cost reduction

By decreasing reflex time and increasing the efficiency of the actions taken against the fires, we can build up the resilience of communities living in fire-prone areas. Incorporating operational support, innovative and financial planning: we aim to expand our DroneSpace by reaching out to young entrepreneurs which forms the foundation of the WSI challenge. Our future plans aim at building the resiliency of vulnerable communities most at risk from the impacts of other natural disasters as well.

We have created this device for the aid of communities living in forest regions or urban regions who face fires, or who wish to be protected from the same. That goes for industries trying to keep their locations and inventories safe or farmers making sure that their crops do not catch fire. But the main target are the governmental fire fighting agencies that would like to monitor the temperature fluctuations of an area, mostly forest regions, before they are burned down in a flaming frenzy.

The current fire detection way is extremely inefficient. Our system makes sure that this problem is settled once for all. It also makes the lives of the firefighters who risk going into the inferno safer, by being able to do the job. Our products can be modified once requested from the agencies to fit their demand to a greater extent. 

Our solution tackles the main problem faced by local populations: fires. It is an extremely vital topic to uphold during the times when fires are becoming more dangerous and the need of more green areas is increasing.

We create a system for the local communities for them to significantly lessen the number of fire breakouts, systematically helping them to increase their resilience and helping them to develop faster.

Therefore, we make the local communities more resilient while helping save lives and property.

Our team has been developing and researching over the project since a long time, and also have created a small 3d model replica. But due to drone laws in our location, we cannot form a proper prototype as of yet. Therefore, we require funds to be able to assemble parts and create the prototype in a location that gives a green light with use of drones. 

Our project as of now consists of preparation of coding and simulation of the potential product, while researching regarding ways to better the current prospect and model.

We use the drone technology to the most efficient use. By using smart sensors and the maneuverability of drones into account, we have created an efficient system to combat forest fires. Instead of using the normal satellite data, which lacks in sending data in time with accuracy, we rely on our drones to scan the thermal mapping of the area to not only provide much better accuracy, but also the limited area makes it faster to react.

Our drone model also has a water pipe attached, which can draw water and spray into critical locations. This makes it much more functional.

With the help of terrain sensors, we can make our drone autonomous in movement, which will provide better stability and control to the department, and an increased rate of finding fire prone locations.

Our idea is currently at the ideation stage. Therefore, currently it does not serve any people.

However, we plan to make this system a part of the fire system in India. According to our financial plans, we plan to have 1 system for each state. Thus at large, our drone will be serving any person in India for the first year.

After we have been well established, we plan to build a multinational company and sell the system in other countries as well. In another 5 years, we should be able to prevent any fires from occuring in atleast 3-4 countries.

Firstly, we started with just an ambitious goal of extended the drones usages to the fire industry.

Then, we came up with a plan of action/idea to make the best out of the resources the world has. 

Now, we are participating in various challenges which might be able to get us some funding to start off with the prototype.

Although using our resources, we have started investing in the project to gather the basic material to make the prototype.

We then plan to pitch the idea with the prototype at various governmental level platforms to get the government's attention and then collaborate to make this idea a reality. However, some apprehensions are still needed to be resolved at further stages.

Our team consists of 5 members, all of them students and working on the project as a passion project. We have sections for research, programming and design.

Members of our team have taken part in many projects before where we have been able to easily deliver our point across, and have shown high aptitude for execution when it comes to programming related projects.

We are a well-balanced team wherein, each person is extremely good at what they do. We have an artist, 2 coding and research specialists, a writer and an advisor.

Our research cannot be molded into shape without being able to assemble the project in outside-India locations due to law restrictions. We would also like to improve our project by finding negatives that we can improve over time.

We use the data we collect and use AI to find fire sensitive areas and focus our attention to placate the conditions specifically there. Therefore, our Machine Learning services can help save the most sensitive of sensitive areas.

Forest Fire is a very prevalent and crucial topic in local communities. To solve the problem that can destroy the lives and economy in the area can lead to much better developed areas and communities.