NOAA Unmanned Aircraft Systems
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NOAA Unmanned Aircraft
Helping Scientists Learn About
Alaskan Ice Seals
Unmanned Aircraft Launched
from NOAA Ship Oscar Dyson
Bridging the Observations Gap Between Earth and Space
Unmanned Aircraft Systems (UAS) can revolutionize NOAA’s ability to monitor and understand the global environment. There is a key information gap today between instruments on Earth’s surface and on satellites — UAS can bridge that gap. Operated by remote pilots and ranging in wingspan from less than six feet to more than 115 feet, UAS can also collect data from dangerous or remote areas, such as the poles, oceans, wildlands, volcanic islands, and wildfires. Better data and observations improve understanding and forecasts, save lives, property, and resources, advancing NOAA’s mission goals.
UAS can help NOAA meet its mission goals with a more advanced fleet capable of collecting data from areas that are currently inaccessible (such as under clouds). Specifically, UAS may:
- Extend hurricane landfall lead times by observing storm environments.
- Improve the accuracy of storm forecasts, benefitting emergency managers and diverse private industries, from energy and tourism to airlines.
- Improve climate change understanding, to help mitigate and plan for it.
- Assess Arctic ice change and affects on ecosystems and coasts.
- Improve flood and drought forecasts, helping water managers.
- Increase safety and success in fighting wildfires that threaten people and property.
- Monitor coasts, oceans, environments important for fish, and marine sanctuaries.
NOAA's UAS Mission Goals
- Conduct UAS research in three test regions: the Arctic, Pacific, and Gulf- Atlantic.
- Obtain presently unattainable data relevant to climate change, hurricanes, Pacific storms, fisheries, marine sanctuaries, endangered species, wate rvapor transport, and coastal zones.
- Improve economic competitiveness in this rapidly developing sector of the aviation industry.
Recent Accomplishments
NOAA researchers and collaborators:
- sent a UAS on 17 flights across Greenland’s Jakobshavn glacier in 2008, gathering data on meltwater lakes.
- flew a UAS into post-tropical storm Noel in 2007, detecting higher winds than found by conventional platforms.
- successfully launched and landed a UAS from a ship — NOAA’s Oscar Dyson, in Puget Sound in 2008.
- successfully tested the ability of a small UAS to measure evaporation from the ocean surface along the California coast, in 2008.
Next
NOAA’s UAS program is also planning:
- a collaborative UAS mission with NASA and Northrup Grumman off the coast of California in 2009, using NASA's Global Hawks to collect atmospheric and other data.
- analyses called OSSEs (Observing System Simulation Experiments), to evaluate the potential impact of UAS-collected data on forecasts.
- to investigate the benefit of UAS in studying hurricane intensity, in a 2010 collaborate experiment with NASA.
Partnerships
NOAA's UAS work draws on expertise from industry, academic, and government partners. This broad coalition seeks to apply technologies used in national defense — including high- and low-altitude UAS, communication technologies, and instruments — to benefit the global environment.