more-in How useful can be a drone capable of transmitting high-definition precision videos and even deliver aid materials in a disaster zone? It could be pretty effective during disasters like the floods that hit the State recently. One such product, which was part of the Drone Rescue Team deployed in the flood-hit Muvattupuzha, garnered eyeballs at the exhibition centre at the venue of the 11th edition of Cocon-2018, a two-day international cybersecurity conference that got under way here on Friday. “We were initially asked by the police to drop relief materials in affected areas. But that was ruled out since the payload was many folds, more than two or three kilograms that our product could afford. Eventually, it was deployed as part of the Drone Rescue Team under the aegis of the Cyberdome (a technological research and development centre of Kerala Police) for tracing people trapped in marooned areas,” said Shine Sreedhar, Chief Technical Officer of Ernakulam-based Srishti Robotics, which had been working on the drone for Cyberdome over the past two years. The company developed drones on their own rather than working on drones brought out by other companies to avoid potential data leakage. Ready-made drones come with inbuilt software by which the companies manufacturing them are able to track the flying route and data collected using their products, said Mr. Sreedhar. The drone is capable of conducting sorties and sending high-definition videos from within a five-kilometre radius. “Plans are afoot to embed a thermal imaging feature shortly, which would enable the drone to scan and capture images from inside buildings,” said Abraham George, head of a technical team who piloted the drone during the sorties in flood-hit Muvattupuzha.

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