NASA Ikhana Assists SoCal Firefighters

ackthpt writes "Ikhana (a NASA drone) is primarily designed for suborbital earth sciences missions, but may be fitted out with a variety of sensors. Wednesday, Ikhana took off from Edwards Air Force Base for a 10 hour mission to observe forest fires in California, scanning the terrain from 23-25,000 feet using a variety of sensors for visible and IR light. Able to remain aloft for up to 30 continuous hours Ikhana serves up information in minutes, a process that takes hours when done by manned aircraft observation. 'The data is processed on the aircraft, up-linked to a satellite and then downloaded to a ground station. From there it's delivered to a computer server at NASA Ames. The imagery is then combined with Google Earth maps. Command center personnel can view the images on their computer screens and then delegate local firefighters accordingly.'"

Comments

Awesome

[Hadlock]

Cut out the middle man (NASA) and you've got basically what they can do in Battlefield 2 from the Commander's view. Another five years and it'll stream straight to the google maps server for this specific function. We've already given google a nasa air strip, it's not long before we'll be giving them our tax dollars to leverage google maps/earth for more purposes beyond recovering crashed aircraft and scouting wildfires.

Hot technology

[GaryOlson]

Can it Google map the hotspots where the really hot sorority girls congregate?

Not as good as they make it out to be

[Anonymous Coward]

"Manned airplanes have to land and download the data. You may not get the data for three or four or five hours" Or you could just use a standard Sierra Wireless AirCard. Thats what the company I work for does on our airplanes up here in Canada.

Re:Why does it look like the Predator-B?

[Dr. Eggman]

Maybe not, but it certainly isn't cheap to.

Re:Why does it look like the Predator-B?

[Neo Quietus]

Because it IS a Predator-B. From the first link: "A Predator B unmanned aerial system has been acquired by NASA's Dryden Flight Re-search Center to support Earth science missions and advanced aeronautical technology development. The aircraft, named Ikhana..." I know, reading the articles, I must be new here.

NASA waste

[bill_mcgonigle]

Can we please de-fund NASA and start spending that money on something with real immediate benefits to the folks here on Earth?

Oh, wait...

Flight track @ FlightAware

[mduell]

http://flightaware.com/live/flight/NASA870

Re:Now?

[LarryRiedel]

I hope the delay is due to this being its first use [...]

I think that particular plane is a NASA research asset, not part of some standard emergency response plan, and was not presumed to be deployed for that particular situation at all.

It's a little late to get maximum benefit from something like this

Maybe not maximum benefit, but I imagine the thermal sensors could be very valuable on Wednesday for places where it was not easy to tell visually where exactly fires were.

Larry

Global Hawk is being used as well

[HotNeedleOfInquiry]

I got a TFR (Temporary Flight Restriction) for Beal AFB, along with a message that they are using their bird to help with the fires. Global Hawks are the only aircraft at Beal that need a TFR to launch.

Re:Why does it look like the Predator-B?

[hitmark]

yet again a military system gets turned into something that can be used in times of peace.

i wonder, can this thing deal with bad weather? as in ocean storms and massive icing?

if so it could potentially be used for search and rescue out at sea, and i would guess that 5-6 of these are cheaper then 5-6 rescue helicopters.

(public perception of) Re:Suborbital?

[theGreater]

The average individual likely cannot explain what the two 'A' characters in NASA stand for unless it's "another" and "astronauts". To them, NASA is the Moon Landing and the Shuttles and the Space Station. It therefore does not seem entirely unreasonable for a project involving "NASA's Suborbital Science Program within the Science Mission Directorate..." to be called, well, sub-orbital.

-theGreater.

Here is a Predator at Edwards, Ikhana or not?

[jerryasher]

Predator at Edwards It's sitting next to a B-1. If you scroll around you can find three V-22s, 2 747 Shuttle Carriers, 2 more B-1s, an SR-71, 3 B-52s, a Flying Boxcar, several warbirds, lots of jets and helicopters and three mechas, mostly disassembled and buried in the sand.

I've started at image for two days, but where's Waldo (pepper)?

Re:Why does it look like the Predator-B?

[bcmm]

I assume a Black Hawk is very much at the expensive end of SAR choppers. They cost $6M each, in the standard US Army configuration (which is assault rather than SAR). A MQ-9 Reaper such as the Ikhana costs $8M, and can't actually pick people up.

Re:Now?

[timeOday]

I'm surprised weather satellites can't provide any information needed for firefighting?

data delivery

[swell]

quote "... for a 10 hour mission to observe forest fires in California, scanning the terrain from 23-25,000 feet using a variety of sensors for visible and IR light. Able to remain aloft for up to 30 continuous hours ..."

So what did it do for the remaining 20 hours? A beer run?

Displaced SoCal citizens could have used that data, we could still use it today (Saturday).

The good news is that the data wasn't entirely restricted to emergency personnel- you and I can see some of the GISified fire data here (pdf):
http://www.sdcountyemergency.com/newsreleases/10262007_1900hrs_Evac_FirePerem.pdf

and here (Google Earth application required):
http://mw1.google.com/mw-earth-vectordb/socalfires/eoc1/root.kml

Re:Now?

[ncc74656]

I'm surprised weather satellites can't provide any information needed for firefighting?

Weather satellites orbit at over 22000 miles away. UAVs can fly at an altitude closer to 22000 feet (or less). They can see things in much greater detail than satellites in geostationary orbit.