Piloted aircraft, unmanned aerial vehicles, drones... How do we make sure that all of these aircraft can fly in the same airspace without colliding? At Odense airport, Denmark, full-scale tests are being carried out.
The coordination tower at Odense International Airport HCA International Airport, Denmark is unlike any other for one special reason: it gives not only planes their flight orders, but drones too, over the 1,900 km2 airspace of the Danish International UAS Centre. It is one of Europe’s best places for experimenting with drones of different types, uses and sizes, bringing together cutting-edge technology and startups for commercial and defence purposes. Tomorrow's airspace is being prepared here with the project NextGen Innovation.
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With the world going through rapid geopolitical transformation, time is short. Coordinating aircraft and drones of different sizes, uses and ranges is essential for defence, emergency material transport and critical infrastructure surveillance.
August Mader's company, AirPlate, has installed a "drone box" at the airport: eight sensors capable of detecting drones within a radius of more than fifteen kilometres.
The equation: academia, startups, cutting-edge tech, essential for testing
At Hans Christian Andersen Airport in Odense, there is an application available that visualises the position of each drone, the pilots and the flight history in real time. Around 15 specialised companies are located within the airport grounds, including the UAS Drone Centre of the University of Southern Denmark (SDU-UAS), which analyses the project data and works closely with the companies. Experiment, crash and learn is their motto.
Jes Hundevadt Jepsen, a researcher at SDU-UAS, explains that they work with hundreds of drones. None of them look like a finished product because the bodywork is missing, but this is precisely what they are looking for: “The good thing about this platform is that everything is exposed. So, if I want to integrate something on it, I can do it right away. If I crash my drone in the morning, I then can replace everything from hardware to, so both the arms itself, but also three different new parts, and then have it up and flying in the afternoon as well. For our drone centre, a lot of our research is in collaboration with companies and that is what the drone industry needs, a close collaboration with academia to actually mature this technology.”
The total budget of the project is more than €9 million, of which 40% has been financed by the European Union's cohesion policy.
According to Interpol data, the global drone market is currently worth €59 billion and will exceed €127 billion by 2036.