For any company involved in the drone industry, be it the hardware, software, or utilization of drones, overcoming issues of BVLOS is a critical milestone. BVLOS is the ability for a drone to be flown Beyond Visual Line of Sight, something that is currently only available to military operations. As Dr. Allison Ferguson, Director of Airspace Safety and Research at PrecisionHawk said, “The ability to fly drones Beyond the Visual Line of Sight (BVLOS) represents the next big opportunity for commercial drone operators. It’s where the greatest, multi-billion-dollar business potential for drones is likely to emerge. Most commercial drone applications would benefit from BVLOS to operate more efficiently and cost-effectively, and some applications would remain impossible to execute without BVLOS. At the moment, no one is allowed to fly BVLOS in U.S. airspace without obtaining a special, hard-to-get waiver from the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA). That means organizations that would stand to benefit from augmenting their operations with BVLOS drones are locked out of capitalizing on the technology’s full potential.” There are countless ways in which a commercial drone business could benefit from BVLOS.

For emergency personnel, BVLOS would mean they could monitor a wider area in a shorter time span to save and protect lives. For the agricultural industry BVLOS would mean farmers cold more efficiently manage their massive fields. Being able to complete BVLOS flights would allow logistical companies to finally make their long promised drone delivery programs a reality. The FAA is currently working with experts across the drone industry to come up with ways that would allow drones to be flown while not in view of their pilot and one company was given the green light to run a BVLOS trial last summer.

In August of 2019 the FAA granted the Kansas Department of Transportation (KDOT) permission to test a true BVLOS program in cooperation with Evergy Power and Iris Automation. In 2018, after a merger between Westar Energy and KCP&L, Evergy Power began providing power to 1.6 million customers throughout the western half of Missouri and the eastern half of Kansas. Iris Automation is a San Francisco, CA based company that has been developing software to enable BVLOS for drones. The program they created is called Casia 360. Iris Automation explains, “Casia 360 is the first commercially available 360 degree radial computer vision Detect-and-Avoid system for Unmanned Aircraft Systems (UAS). As an integrated onboard hardware and software solution, Casia systems are small, light and low power. Casia enables safe Beyond Visual Line of Sight (BVLOS) operations that reduce costs and open new access to goods and data. A wide range of long distance commercial applications are now a reality with Casia onboard.”

Casia works by using onboard cameras to gather 360 degree real time situational awareness. This data is instantly interpreted by the onboard AI computer system to make flight adjustments for speed and direction, eliminating possibility of collision. It has the highest level of detection and avoidance capabilities and is compatible with any commercial drone, making it the perfect tool for KDOT and Evergy Power to inspect power lines in rural Kansas. Evergy Power had already been using drones to inspect power lines throughout their territory. Using the drones, while in view of an inspector and pilot has sped up line inspection tremendously, a reason why many power companies are now using drones in their daily inspection processes. While the FAA granted the BVLOS waiver August, it wasn’t until November that weather conditions were safe enough to fly the trials.

A team of 31 people from KDOT, Evergy Power, Iris Automation, and the Kansas State University UAS Integration Pilot Program (IPP) spent two days testing Casia in a true BVLOS operation. Over the course of 7 separate flights, the drone inspected 150 miles of power lines with no pilot interference. Every aspect of the flight was completed by the drone’s onboard computer system. “This marks the first true BVLOS flight in the nation and is a tremendous milestone for the drone industry,” said Iris Automation CEO Alexander Harmsen. “We see this as one of the most notable accomplishments to come from the IPP program to date. We’re thrilled to set the precedent and bring our industry’s utilization of drones from dream to reality.” While this doesn’t mean that Amazon and Walmart will now be getting FAA waivers to use a program like Casia to make deliveries, it is a huge step in that direction.