Parachuting quadcopter shoots off its personal propellers to take out different drones

The identical qualities that make drones incredible instruments for capturing wonderful aerial footage also can make them a real menace that’s tough to intercept when misused. But a intelligent new design for an anti-drone countermeasure makes use of a second drone that sacrifices itself mid-flight to disable its goal.

As the capabilities of drones have improved dramatically over the previous decade, so have the instruments designed to disable drones after they pose a menace. Multiple approaches have been taken, together with units that may interrupt the wi-fi alerts between a drone and a pilot and drive the offending flier to both land or crash. Even lasers have been confirmed efficient, because the Navy recently demonstrated utilizing Lockheed Martin’s Layered Laser Defense weapon that may destroy a goal mid-flight. But these approaches depend on {hardware} that may be very costly.

A cheaper answer is merely launching nets at a drone to tangle up its spinning rotors and knock it out of the sky, however even this comes with its personal challenges. Ground-launched nets require a drone to be flying low sufficient to the bottom to be in vary, whereas nets launched from another drone within the air require a big and costly craft that’s sturdy sufficient to hold a powered launcher beneath it. Both of these approaches additionally require propellants to truly launch the web, akin to explosives or compressed fuel, which must be changed or replenished after each launch.

Aleksey Zaitsevsky, a hacker and skilled drone builder from Lithuania, seems to have give you a better anti-drone solution that’s cheaper and simple to reset after a profitable takedown.

Created utilizing the identical chassis, motors, and propellers which might be used to construct quick and extremely maneuverable racing drones, Zaitsevsky’s Interceptor Drone advantages from a excessive power-to-weight ratio, permitting it to rapidly intercept one other flying goal. Depending on its payload, stated goal will in all probability be transferring at significantly slower speeds.

Cameras onboard the Interceptor Drone present a real-time view of the goal to a pilot on the bottom, permitting them to evaluate whether or not or not the drone in query poses a real menace. If it does, the Interceptor Drone is then piloted and positioned beneath its goal, at which level its 4 motors and propellers quickly speed up and detach from the drone, flying upwards whereas dragging a deployed kevlar web that spreads out and disables the opposite craft by tangling its personal rotors.

The use of the high-powered drone racing motors permits the Interceptor Drone to launch a bigger web than different airborne launch programs can accommodate, and because the motors detach from the craft, a parachute is deployed which delivers it safely to the bottom and leaves it able to be rapidly reset. Although it’s not an autonomous answer to drone interception—a talented drone racing pilot is required for the Interceptor Drone to precisely do its job—as anti-drone applied sciences go, this drone is extremely compact and light-weight and could be transported in a small field, permitting a automobile to hold a number of models and cope with a number of targets.