Flyability, the market leader for confined space drones, announced the release of a Smart Return-to-Home (RTH) feature for their flagship Elios 3 drone. This new development is the first step in a long-term commitment to growing the Elios 3’s autonomous capabilities.
The Smart Return-to-Home feature enables Elios 3 pilots to instruct the drone to autonomously return to the take-off point using the shortest return path while dynamically avoiding obstacles. During flight, Smart RTH monitors the drone battery level via a new flight management gauge, informing the pilot when it is time to fly back and maximizing the available time for inspections.
Smart Return-to-Home is initiated via Flyability’s flight app, Cockpit, and the pilot can retake control at any time. Through this tool, Flyability provides pilots with greater peace of mind when flying in challenging environments, giving them more time to focus on the inspection at hand. They can maximize available flight time without worrying about battery management or the return flight and trust the drone to safely bring itself home.
Smart RTH marks a breakthrough in Flyability’s path to autonomous drone operations and longterm commitment to developing more autonomous features. Smart RTH uses real-time LiDAR scans to feed an onboard autonomy engine with information, which the drone then converts into a flight plan it automatically executes. As a result, the Elios 3 drone is now capable of situational analysis and making a decision based on that data.
This autonomy engine can then be developed to include new capabilities, such as collision avoidance or obstacle recognition.
“With Smart Return-to-Home, the Elios 3 autonomously navigates the most complex indoor mazes and can even squeeze through manholes barely larger than itself, surpassing the capabilities of any other robot! This is a major step toward fully autonomous operations, enabled by state-of-the-art navigation algorithms, our Flyaware mapping engine combining LiDAR and cameras, and the Elios 3’s unique collision tolerance. This development aligns with our vision of making drone inspections effortless for anyone, even in the most demanding missions, and we’re excited to keep pushing the boundaries of what’s possible in confined space navigation”, says Adrien Briod, Flyability Co-Founder and CTO.
Flyability’s Smart Return-to-Home is live and available for Elios 3 premium users. On April 15th, Flyability will host a webinar to share the key features of this new release and its vision for future autonomy developments. Registration for the webinar is available on Flyability’s website.
