Spectral Evidence of Ice

The SEI project will experiment spectral sensor fusion techniques of data acquired by UAVs during aircraft pre-flight inspection. In General Aviation, an important safety issue regards the presence of ice on the aircraft's fuselage and wings. Ice on the wings can cause loss of lift and stalling, which in most cases would result, during take-off phase, in airplane’s fatal crash. Another important aspect to consider is the high amount of de-icing liquid usually involved in the process incurring in high costs and considerable damage to the environment. This is not a typical industrial scenario, but the project addresses important aspects related to the manufacturing sector: - it has to accomplish specific tasks following a design process; - it involves human operators (labour) collaborating with machines and tools; - it includes the usage of semi-raw materials (glycol fluids) to accomplish a service; - it sees serialization of the process that could be invoked at any needed time. Moreover: - it targets safety issues both for operators and machines regarding reliability of results at the end of the process; - it is order-based, comparable to a discrete manufacturing process.