Aerospace
“In terms of flammable gasses, the item in the vicinity of a flare inspection that is going to be most likely to ignite gasses is the flare itself. This means that for a flare inspection, the risk is extremely low even though the drone is not intrinsically safe.
“If you inspect something where hydrocarbons have not been ignited, for example a cold vent stack, we have to use a gas sensor to be safe, which would trip an alarm if the hydrocarbons go over the explosive limit that has been set for that particular inspection.”
Risk mitigation Roberts contends that the issue of intrinsic safety can be addressed by going through the appropriate risk mitigation steps. In addition to still imagery, Cyberhawk also uses video and thermal photography, so it can perform thermographic surveys too.
The company uses separate cameras at the moment because the way the drones are configured, a gas sensor for ongoing monitoring would be mounted along with something else like a stills camera. A thermal camera would be mounted by
itself, but Cyberhawk looking at ways of mounting both types of camera.
As an inspection and surveying company that specialises in the use of drones, an aviation department buys drones in that have been designed for purpose in partnership with the manufacturer. Several modifications are made to the basic drone, so it is not an off-the-shelf product.
The company’s market segments are onshore and offshore oil and gas installations in Europe, Middle East and Asia, and power utilities for inspection of electrical power pylons and renewable energy. It has 10 to 15 drones in service deployed all around the world except the US, where there is a moratorium on commercial drone flying.
Roberts adds: “The US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) is going through a number of ‘pipe cleaning’ activities to see how they will open up its airspace, but right now it is illegal except for academic use, so universities can apply for a particular research permit.
“Some oil and gas companies are using
Fig. 2. The
Cyberhawk two- man operating team.
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