NASA and Verizon to Develop Drone Tracking System

With the number of civilian and commercial drones in the air increasing with every single day, it’s about time that someone came up with a system to manage this ever increasing traffic of flying robots in the skies.

According to The Guardian, NASA and Verizon have announced a plan to develop a drone tracking system that makes use of cellphone towers in the US. Under this partnership, which was signed last year, NASA will be developing a drone traffic management system using radar, satellites or cellular signals. Testing of this system will begin this summer. Companies such as Google and Amazon, which are developing their own drone programs, will also be assisting the development.

Google has pledged $450,000 to share data from its Project Wing tests to assist in developing the new tracking system. It also hopes to test its self-driving cars at NASA’s Ames Research Center in California under the agreement. Ames is also the site where Amazon has spent $1.8 million to test and develop its Prime Air delivery drones.

Verizon, on the other hand, will be developing a system to monitor drones using its cellular network. The system is expected to be finalized by 2019.

The entire system, valued at $500,000, aims to facilitate safe flying for commercial and civilian drones and restricting them from flying into sensitive airspace (such as the White House). The system will also allow air traffic controllers to ground drones during bad weather and to manage drone traffic to avoid collisions.

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