With systems designed for the extremes of scientific research around the world, and purpose-built to monitor and assess natural phenomena such as hurricanes, tornadoes, and volcanoes, Black Swift Technologies took time out to talk us through their extraordinary systems.
In the article below the company discusses what it takes to design and build unmanned aerial systems to meet the complex demands of nomadic scientific field campaigns in harsh environments.
Black Swift Technologies has a reputation for specializing in unmanned aerial systems for flying scientific missions in demanding environments. The Black Swift S2 in particular has been custom-built for scientific research, what challenges are environmental researchers facing that lead them to choose your UAS?
Scientists usually study phenomena where waiting for ideal weather conditions could cost them valuable data, which leads them to our S2 UAS.
The challenge with finding a UAS that is capable of performing scientific research missions is ensuring that the UAS is able to meet the demands of high-altitude flights through strong winds and damaging airborne particulates. The Black Swift S2 has a larger payload capacity, longer endurance, higher ceiling, and greater range than other vehicles. It is capable of flying in difficult regions and harsh environments.
Regardless of conditions, the S2 can provide nearly 24/7 data-gathering services. The field-swappable payload system enables rapid changes of the payload in the field without any specialized tools, allowing a single aircraft to be useful for multiple different applications. The aircraft can fly cameras when conditions are clear, but the payload can easily be changed to something other than cameras when conditions are less than ideal.
The Black Swift E2 is unique in that it carries its payload at the nose rather than the underside, can you talk us through the advantages of this?
With the payload upfront instead of on the under-belly, users are able to have a full field-of-view, even when looking up.
The E2 UAS was designed for structural and industrial inspections, providing precise, reliable, and safe navigation around complex structures and delivering real-time data to its operator. The E2 also has a quick change payload bay that enables swapping of the sensor packages. The payload can be customized depending on the operator’s requirements. The battery pack is also easy to change and the placement is adjustable depending on the weight of the payload that the aircraft must carry, accommodating a wide range of sensors.
The SwiftCore™ Flight Management System (FMS) has a growing following of commercial users and has been approved and used for major scientific and research missions by NASA and NOAA. Can you outline for our readers the advantages of this system?
The Swift Core Flight Management System has been proven to provide a cost-effective, powerful and easy-to-operate system. There are several advantages of the system that allow it to meet the demands of nomadic scientific field campaigns in harsh environments.
The Swift Core FMS runs on an Android-based tablet as well as Android-based smartphones and provides an interface that users are familiar with, while providing operators with mobility and the ability to immediately begin data collection.
“The user focused interface makes flight planning simple and easy to accomplish and mission monitoring and mapping is all done from a hand-held device that doesn’t require a table to operate.”
Flight precision is essential in ensuring accurate data collection and the tablet-based system is able to generate proper flight plans in the field that can be modified and uploaded mid-flight. The Swiftcore FMS enables users to easily deploy their UAS with minimal training.
The Black Swift S0 features a unique tail design and can undertake fully autonomous missions at altitudes of up to 15,000 feet AGL – what challenges was the Black Swift S0 designed to overcome and can you share any of the missions it has been deployed on?
The Black Swift S0 was designed as a solution for users such as the National Oceanic Atmospheric Association (NOAA) to be able to routinely collect valuable meteorological and oceanic data within the tropical cyclone boundary layer that is too dangerous to explore using manned aircraft.
The S0 is able to sample kinematics and thermodynamics of the lower part of the boundary layer and is rugged enough to withstand the harsh weather environment within the lowest and most dangerous part of the storm.
In 2023, NOAA hurricane researchers successfully deployed the Black Swift S0 into Hurricane Tammy to measure the lower atmosphere of the storm. The characteristics of the Black Swift S0 proved equally valuable to the United States Air Force and, while NOAA required an air-deployed aircraft, Black Swift Technologies was able to make minor alterations to the S0 resulting in a design capable of vertical take-off and landing (VTOL) that met the requirements of the USAF.
What are your plans for 2024 and beyond?
Black Swift Technologies continuously works to be leaders in innovation when it comes to building reliable, robust, high-quality uncrewed aircraft systems. Our 2024 projects strive to advance the capabilities of UAS and expand the range of UAS applications.
We plan to provide Beyond Visual Line of Sight (BVLOS) solutions that can cover long distances and continue to integrate the latest in vision-based sensing technologies to improve reliability and autonomy.
Black Swift Technologies received funding from NASA to develop an uncrewed vehicle that could navigate Venus’ atmosphere while gathering data. Black Swift’s proposal of a vehicle that would take advantage of Venus’ winds to harness enough energy to fly is just one example of the ways that we’re always looking for cutting-edge applications of UAS.
Thanks so much for taking the time to talk to us today, we look forward to hearing about the next exciting challenges Black Swift undertakes.
