A 12-month trial is being undertaken involving ultimate approval by the UK Civil Aviation Authority for beyond-visual-line-of-sight multiple-drone operations. Artificial intelligence analysis tools are being developed to determine critical changes in collected visual, lidar and positioning inspection data that might herald deterioration in pylon or other infrastructure components. During an initial test in Nottingham, an autonomous drone was dispatched with minimal instructions. It was able to find its inspection target and complete the programmed inspection in a few minutes. A manual inspection could take up to an hour for the same task. If things go well, it is not impossible to be able to project multiple drones operating with minimal human control, taking on huge swaths of pylons, cabling, insulators and other elements during regular inspections, saving a lot of time and money.
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