Drones

DroneBullet is like a guided anti-aircraft missile for suspect quadcopters

The range of technologies designed to take suspicious drones out the sky is growing wider and wider
The range of technologies designed to take suspicious drones out the sky is growing wider and wider

Just as new uses for drones continue to surface (both good and bad), so too do ways to stop them in their tracks. Intended for authorities looking to control sensitive airspace, the DroneBullet from Canadian startup AerialX takes a rather heavy-handed approach, claiming to knock suspicious aircraft clean out of the sky.

Never mind the murky waters surrounding the legality of attacking other people's drones while they fly through the air, anti-drone products are coming thick and fast. The range of handheld anti-drone guns from DroneShield is a notable example, blasting the aircraft with electromagnetic noise at just the right frequency so as to block the radio signals used for control communications, bringing them to ground.

Other, less passive approaches include training birds of prey to quite literally pluck drones out of the sky, capturing them in nets cast from fellow drones and even turning to shotguns. AerialX's DroneBullet is more at home with these latter examples than the former, and though the company doesn't divulge too much about how the technology works as it is apparently in "stealth mode," a video seen below does show the technology in action.

In it, we see an anonymous drone pilot with nefarious intentions load a regular quadcopter up with explosives and set it in motion towards an unknown target.

Little does our protagonist know that waiting somewhere in the wings is AerialX's DroneBullet, a missile-shaped projectile with four propellers of its own, which combine with deep learning and machine vision software to take off and hurtle towards the moving target. A "powerful kinetic strike" follows and the sinister drone falls to the ground, while the intact DroneBullet comes down to land in one piece.

AerialX's technology relies on micro radio detectors to pick out drones as they enter certain sections of airspace, like over an airport or a concert for example, and automatically plot the unknown aircraft on a map. In this way, it bills its product as an appropriate solution for law enforcement or defense forces trying to secure sensitive airspace and keep folks safe.

You can check out the video below.

Source: AerialX

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3 comments
guzmanchinky
Hmmm, seems legit, however it seems like it barely hit the drone, and if it missed by even a tiny bit, and the drone recovered, does the attacking drone chase it down and try again?
alexander31
So we now have a situation where a company is building a guided missile and marketing it as an anti drone tool. Nothing prevents someone from buying this and strapping explosives to this or simply flying it into a passenger aircraft engine. The FAA will need to step in here.
f8lee
Seems to me the problem regarding providing safety is the same as it is with Israel's Iron Dome system or the SDI/Star Wars plan in Reagan's day - the enemy could (relatively) easily launch dozens of autonomous drones knowing that if only one or two make it through this kind of protection the point will have been made. So while it's nifty to see this approach, I don't know that it can be 100% successful.