Drone Impact Ruled Out as Cause of Incident With Damaged Jetliner

A Grupo Aeromexico SAB airliner said to have been hit by a drone last December was actually damaged when a poorly done repair on the plane caused its nose to collapse and crack as it prepared to land.

An examination of the Boeing Co. 737-800’s crimped nose cone by the company’s forensic experts ruled out a collision with a drone or any other object, including birds, according to a report it submitted to the National Transportation Safety Board earlier this month. The document was reviewed by Bloomberg News.

Local media reports said the jetliner hit a drone as it neared Tijuana, Mexico, for a landing on Dec. 12. The plane’s nose cone, also known as a radome, was shown in photos with its front-left side caved in and cracked in multiple places.

The initial story created a stir because it would have been the first time a small consumer drone was implicated in a collision with a large jet. Within days, London’s Gatwick Airport was forced to shut for parts of three days after a drone was ..

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£4m in government funding granted to project for wind farm repairs using autonomous boats and drones 

A new research project which aims to develop a system of crawling robots and driverless boats to quickly repair offshore wind farms has been given £4.2m in government funding from Innovate UK.

The project involves organisations including the universities of Bristol and Manchester, as well as Wootzano, a British company developing an electronic skin for robots.

Engineers hope to use Thales’ Halcyon autonomous boats as well as drones which can survey any damage to the wind turbines and lift crawling robots on to the turbine’s blades.

The project, which will run for two years, is using BladeBUG robots, which use suction pads to crawl along the turbine blades. The Royal College of Art Robotics Laboratory is developing a robot arm which can be fitted onto the robots in order to repair the turbine blades whilst the devices cling to them.

If successful, the project could save the average wind farm around £26m in repair costs over the course of its lifetime, researchers said.

Martin Bourt..

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Finland heats up, drone deliveries, and the Helsinki Biennial – Finland in the World Press 

ONE WIDELY-SHARED ARTICLE in the world press this week came from a popular science magazine which revealed that despite Finland’s efforts to fight climate change, the country is actually warming up at double the global average rate. They also interviewed Finland’s former environment minister to get her thoughts on the looming ecological catastrophe.

In other news, tech pundits and publications have been focusing heavily on the impending rollout of drone deliveries in Eastern Helsinki. The drones, which are operated by Google’s parent company, will be delivering upscale groceries and takeout food in the Vuosaari area of the city, one of the first such rollouts of its size in the world.

There has also been increasing coverage of Helsinki upcoming Biennial Art Festival, which aims to replicate the success of similar modern art fairs in Miami, Venice, and New York.

Finland is warming at twice the global rate

Fair Observer

Finland is a country of fascinating and stark contrasts — ..

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