Bird-like robotic drones to fly all over China

Taking a leaf out of sci-fi movies of the past, China has developed bird-like robotic drones for surveillance purposes.

As per a report by the South China Morning Post (SCMP), in recent years, at least 30 military and government agencies have deployed dove-like drones in around five provinces in China. This technology has been used extensively in the Xinjiang Uygur autonomous region in China’s far west which borders Mongolia, Russia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Afghanistan, Pakistan and India. The Chinese government has always viewed this area as a hotbed for separatism and have deployed these drones for surveillance.

Song Bifeng, a professor at Northwestern Polytechnical University in Xian  is leading this programme, codenamed ‘Dove’. Yang Wenqing, a member of Song’s team told SCMP, “The scale is still small compared to other types of drones in use today. We believe the technology has good potential for large-scale use in the future … it has some unique advantages to meet the demand for drones in the military and civilian sectors.”

These drones mimic the flapping action of real birds to fly, ascend, descend and turn in the air. The current robots mimic up to 90 percent of the movements of a real bird. Also, they produce very less noise and are so life-like that real birds fly alongside them. This was observed after around 2000 test-flights conducted by the researchers before deploying them in real life.

A researcher, under the condition of anonymity also told SCMP that while the technology is still in its early stages of development, there could be many possible uses in future. These include the police, military, emergency services, environmental protection and urban planning. In their current avatar, the bird-drones weigh around 200 grams and can fly at speeds of up to 40 KMPH for around 30 minutes.