UAVs SAVING LIVES

UAVs SAVING LIVES

            One must appreciate the time we are living in and the new technology that has come to use in the last twenty-five years. Cell phones and drones have evolved at such a rapid pace and have changed the entire world’s view, on just about everything. And now, drones are delivering lifesaving packages that are giving hope to so many people.

            I first came across this story that talked about interesting uses of drones and one story really triggered my interest. It talked about humanitarian relief that was taking place in Rwanda, with a company called Zipline (Cox, 2017). I was blown away by the difference this company was making, so I did a little investigating to see what this company was all about.

PROBLEM AND SOLUTION

            I discovered that the people in Rwanda were dying or nearly dying because lifesaving medications and treatments such as blood and vaccines were not available when most needed by the patients. Patients were dying when traveling from one hospital to another hospital. Not all of their country’s facilities offer the same treatments, the travel time was taking hours and the patients were suffering more just to gain a simple treatment where they already were. Among the difficulty that Uganda is faced with medical facilities, Globally, postpartum hemorrhage (PPH) remains the leading cause of maternal deaths (Ononge, 2016). Even though any women have the possibility of PPH after 20 weeks’ gestation, or halfway through a pregnancy, the United States has a low percentage of this occurring, where the highest burden is experienced in low-income countries (Belfort, 2018).

            After review, The Government of Rwanda found the solution they were looking for, by partnering with the robotics company, Zipline. In October 2016, Zipline –Muhanga became the first country in the world to incorporate drone technology into its health care system at the service of saving lives (Zipline, 2018). Zipline- Muhanga services 21 hospitals across Western Rwanda, in challenging inclement weather, demand spikes and most importantly, lifesaving urgency. These drones fly autonomously to the hospital, making a precise drop-off within a designated drop zone of about two car lengths (Zipline, 2018).

OPERATION AND SETUP

Zipline – Muhanga is divided into different teams:

1.     Flight Ops- Employees that take care of preflight plans, packing and reading packages, also making sure that the planes are able to fly

2.     Health Ops – Include all the people knowledgeable of the blood product and other medications or treatments that may be flown to the hospitals. This part of the Zipline team receives the orders by text messaging or through WhatsApp (Who would have guessed?)

            To avoid expiration, Zipline – Muhanga provides cold chain, a temperature controlled supply chain (Zipline, 2018). An unbroken cold chain is an uninterrupted series of refrigerated production, storage and distribution activities, along with associated equipment and logistics which maintain a desired low temperature range (WHO, 2018). Flying over 62 mi/hr., products arrive faster than any other mode of transport, with no pilot required. Not only is Zipline’s blood transport saving lives, it has improved the entire supply chain procedure in this portion of Rwanda (Zipline, 2018). The deliveries will reach the facility treating the patient on an average of less than 20 minutes. With the technology of Zipline and the leadership of the Rwandan Government and health system staff to decide which products will be flown and how they should be packaged, together they have provided lifesaving treatments to hundreds of thousands of Rwandan people since October of 2016. Zipline’s just-in-time drone delivery has ensured that hospitals always have access to blood products. Increasing the use of some blood products by 175% and reducing waste and spoilage by over 95% (Zipline, 2018). This is very important because the life expectancy of Rwandan is 54 years (men) and 57 years (women) so every lifesaving procedure is important (BBC, 2017).

ZIPLINE EXPANSION

After years of testing and thousands of deliveries, Zipline is expanding its operation to the rest of Rwanda. Zipline – Kayonza will be the second distribution center in Rwanda, opening later this year and will service the Eastern half of the country (Zipline, 2018).

                        It’s the greatest investment you have: our people. And every single opportunity                                that can add value to what you’re doing, we take it.  

                                                                                                            – Dr. Diane Gashumba --                                                                                                                    Minister of Health, Rwanda

            Zipline is also expanding to Tanzania. Zipline-Dodoma will be Tanzania’s first distribution center, which is currently in construction. The future projects for Tanzania is to bring three more distribution centers, Zipline-Mwanza, Zipline-Geita, and Zipline-Mbeya (Zipline, 2018). These four distribution centers will help deliver emergency medical products to the rural regions of Tanzania, to help the millions of Tanzanians in the near future.

            Research shows that another country that would benefit from Zipline’s life saving UAVs, would be Uganda. Having the same issues that Rwanda and Tanzania are having. The drugs that need cold storage where not available because of unstable electricity supply, making the blood and other medications needing cold chain operations, unsuitable to use. Uganda is also having issues with the lack of blood products at facilities. On top of all those issues, 48% of baby deliveries are occurring at home (Ononge, 2016). Ugandan health services have a service level system, which mean not all facilities can provide the same services, like blood transfusions. Patients will either have to wait for treatment or travel to get treatment, in a critical state. These patients are the ones suffering the most. It will be exciting to see the day that Zipline moves its distribution centers into Uganda.

ZIPLINE BACKGROUND

            Zipline’s Head Quarters is located in California, USA. On April 3, 2018, they stated that Zipline has improved their drones and unveiled the fastest commercial delivery drone on earth. Zipline’s newest generation of autonomous aircraft flies farther, faster and with more cargo than ever before (Dukowitz, 2018). Zipline has completely redesigned the logistics system, which dramatically improves the system’s launch, autonomous flight, and landing capabilities. This will give the drones the ability to increase the number of daily delivery flights and increase the radius of each distribution center to serve populations up to 10 million people. This awesome new generation drone is a fixed-wing style airplane, can fly at a top speed of 128 km/h, and a cruising speed of 101 km/h. The new plane is capable of flying four times faster than the average quadcopter drone and can serve an area 200 times as large (Dukowitz, 2018). Zipline’s CEO Keller Rinaudo states that, “The new aircraft and distribution center system we’re unveiling today will help Zipline scale to meet the needs of countries around the world-including the United States” (Zipline, 2018). Zipline has a diverse personal which includes aerospace veterans from SpaceX, Boeing, NASA, and Google, who design and operates an autonomous system for delivering lifesaving medicine to the world’s most difficult to reach places (Zipline, 2018).

DRONE DELIVERY IN THE UNITED STATES

            March 6-8, 2018, the FAA UAS Symposium took place in Baltimore. The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) talks about the drone pilot integration program. FAA’s Acting Administrator, Dan Elwell tests of the automated Low Altitude Authorization and Notification Capability (LAANC) system will be expanded. This is an important step towards an Unmanned Aircraft Systems Traffic Management System (UTM). FAA’s Part 107 small drone LAANC program will deploy to nearly 300 air traffic facilities starting in April 2018. Hoping to reduce ‘noncompliant’ drone flights by 30% by introducing LAANC to a larger group of air traffic facilities. (Kesteloo, 2018).

            The FAA created the UAS Integration Pilot Program (UASIPP) as an opportunity for state, local, and tribal governments to partner with the private sector to accelerate the development and deployment of safe commercial drone innovation in the country (FAA, 2018). The key priority of the program is integrating autonomous, beyond visual line-of-sight flights over populated areas into the FAA’s National Airspace System (NAS). The FAA is expected to formally approve UASIPP projects in the coming weeks. Zipline project chosen as a part of this process are expected to commence operation by the close of 2018 (Dukowitz, 2018).

UAV NEWS AROUND THE WORLD

·     Airmap and Skyguide partner to create Europe’s First National Drone Traffic Management System (Kesteloo, 2018). Airmap is a leading airspace intelligence platform and Skyguide is a Swiss air navigation provider. They plan to create Unmanned Traffic Management (UTM), also known as U-Space. This program will first be launched in Switzerland, with a pilot phase in June 2018 and planning to be fully operational by 2019 (Kesteloo, 2018).

·      The United Kingdom’s National Air Traffic Control Service (NATS) is planning to scrap the rule that prevents drone pilots to fly unmanned aerial vehicles beyond the line-of-sight. This could open up opportunities to start making deliveries by drones as early as 2019 (Kesteloo, 2018).  

·       SF Express, China’s second largest courier, just got the first official permit to deliver packages by drone. The license was granted by the Civil Aviation Administration of China, CAAC (Tang, 2018). SF Express plans to use the drones to make deliveries to rural, low populated areas in China. SF Express has been working on drone delivery since 2013. In 2017, SF Express subsidiary delivered emergency supplies in China’s Yunnan province using a drone that was capable of carrying 1.3 tons (Dukowitz, 2018). SF Express will only be licensed for eastern China.

·   Drone Delivery Canada Corp. has received a compliance certificate from the federal government last week. The Compliant UAV Operator Special Flight Operations Certificate (SFOC) that the company received from Transport Canada, allows beyond ‘line-of-sight’ drone operations. Beyond the line-of-sight is the crucial component in commercial drone deliveries. This certificate will make commercial drone deliveries in remote communities in northern Ontario a reality. This will make a huge impact on Moose Factory, an island that is isolated from the rest of the world twice a year because the water is not hard enough to drive on but also too icy for a boat. Canadians on Moose Factory will have the ability to receive packages up to 10 pounds (Kesteloo, 2018).

WRITER’S TAKE

Zipline’s ability and willingness to help those who need the most help around the world is one of the greatest stories that I have read about in a long time. Zipline’s drone technology is truly making an impact on so many lives. Zipline is saving lives of men, women, and children and making sure that new born babies have the ability to grow up with their mothers. What can a person say except, thank you and well done!

Belfort, M. (2018, March). Overview of postpartum hemorrhage. Up to Date. Retrieved from https://www.uptodate.com/contents/overview-of-postpartum-hemorrhage#H1

BBC News (2017, August 06). Rwanda country profile. BBC News. Retrieved from www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-14093238

Cox, L. (2017, July 10). 6 interesting uses of drones. Disruption. Retrieved from https://disruptionhub.com/6-interesting-uses-drones/

Dukowitz, Z. (2018, April 04). Big news on the drone delivery front: Zipline announces world’s fastest delivery drone and Chinese company secures first drone delivery license. UAVCoach. Retrieved from https://uavcoach.com/zipline-sfe-xpress/

FAA. (2018, April 11). UAS integration pilot program. Federal Aviation Administration. Retrieved from https://www.faa.gov/uas/programs_partnerships/uas_integration_pilot_program/

Kesteloo, H. (2018, March 06). Airmap and skyguide partner to create Europe’s first national drone traffic management system. DroneDJ. Retrieved from https://dronedj.com/2018/03/06/airmap-and-skyguide-partner-to-create-europes-first-national-drone-traffic-management-system/

Kesteloo, H. (2018, March 07). FAA symposium – Drone identification and new powers to mitigate the clueless, the careless, and the criminals. DroneDJ. Retrieved from https://dronedj.com/2018/03/07/faa-symposium-drone-identification-and-new-powers-to-mitigate-the-clueless-the-careless-and-the-criminals/

Kesteloo, H. (2018, February 14). Canadian company receives federal certificate for drone delivery. DroneDJ. Retrieved from  https://dronedj.com/2018/02/14/canadian-company-receives-federal-certificate-for-drone-delivery/

Ononge, S. Mirembe, F. Wandabwa, J., & Campbell, O. (2016, April 14). Incidence and risk factors for postpartum hemorrhage in Uganda. Reproductive Health. doi: 10:1186/s12978-016-0154-8 Retrieved from https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4832492/

Tang, V. (2018, March 28). SF express to use drones for delivery in China’s remote regions. China Money Network. Retrieved from https://www.chinamoneynetwork.com/2018/03/28/sf-express-use-drones-delivery-chinas-remote-regions

WHO. (2018). EPI logistics- Cold chain. World Health Organization. Retrieved from http://www.who.int/countries/eth/areas/immunization/epi_logistics/en/index1.html

Zipline. (2018). Lifesaving deliveries by drone. Retrieved from www.flyzipline.com.