Drones have had different functions since they entered society a few years ago. There are many companies that use drones to facilitate their work or lower costs. The New York-based company Reign Maker has developed a drone that is capable of taking water samples more quickly, simply and cheaply. Cities have to check their local waterways for pollution from time to time, often using boats full of workers. With this new invention, you could save time and lower costs.
This drone is called Nixie, and its structure has a docking mechanism on the top and a 500 milliliter water collection hose with a bracket that can be locked on the bottom. It can be attached to a DJI Matrice 600 or Matrice 300 RTK model drone that is provided and driven by the customer. For an additional fee, the company will provide a drone and a pilot.
The hose that collects the water is made of aluminum and weighs 2.5 kilos (or 3 if the sample bottle is full). In addition, it is 1.22 meters long. This hose must be properly attached to both the drone and the bottle to avoid possible water leaks or a malfunction.
Optimal performance
As for its operation, the drone flies over the water with the base protruding vertically below it. The drone pilot then lowers the aircraft until the water collection hose is submerged by about two feet. Once the bottle is full, the drone returns back to shore, where the bottle is removed and exchanged for a new empty one to collect the next sample.
According to Reign Maker, in just three minutes you can collect one sample and start the next one. In addition, an application that comes with the drone can track the GPS coordinates where the samples have been taken so that in future water collections the exact place where the test was done can be known.
Many costs are reduced
The New York City Department of Environmental Protection takes approximately 14,000 annual water quality samples, using boats and crew, bringing the cost of each sample to about $ 100. However, with the Nixie drone a team of just two people can collect up to 120 samples in about seven hours, making each sample cost just $ 10 to collect. With this new system, samples are taken 75% faster.
You can now reserve this drone for a price of $ 850. A more advanced model is also in the works that will not only collect water samples but also analyze them. This advanced model would have a much higher cost, about $ 6,500.
