Digital Twin-based Unmanned Air Traffic Management for Emergency Response

Abstract

The use of drones or UAVs for commercial and civilian purposes has grown steadily in the last years, however the legislature governing their use is very slow to adapt to the new possibilities that the developing technology delivers. The existing regulations are mostly based on commercial flight regulations and do not encompass the whole spectrum that the UAV solutions can provide. While each country follows their own regulations, most are still restrictive for a broader use of UAVs. The use of UAVs for emergency uses, surveillance, and monitoring has been broadly studied. As such UAVs can be used to transport human organs or medical supplies, detect forest fires, monitor flooding, provide or extend communication range in case of outages, etc. The current regulations in most countries with their restrictions currently do not provide a viable solution to fully employ this UAV capabilities without a lot of administrative work. As the use of drones can pose a hazard for the population as well as the environment, solid regulations are necessary to minimize any risk, however too strict regulations can prevent an efficient use of drones. Changing the regulations to provide a broader use of drones would only increase the risks without addressing the main issues. A digital platform for unmanned aerial traffic management proposed in this paper addresses these issues directly and provides grounds for the changing of the regulations to allow a broader use of drones. Designing the platform as a digital twin of the aerial surveillance process allow for detailed overview that not only observes the currently active UAV data but can predict potential hazards and act accordingly to prevent them or minimize their effects, this increasing overall safety of UAVs, the environment, and general populace.