Imagine you wake up with a newspaper in your hand featuring these headlines. Sad. Isn’t it? But this problem is faced in many parts of the world these days. People are dying, not because of some war or disaster or some life threatening disease but because of hunger. To make this situation a little better, Nigel Gifford, founder and chairman of Windhorse Aerospace, came up with the idea of an Edible Drone.
What actually is Edible Drone?
What a relaxing and beautiful site it would be for a war or disaster prone area to see an edible drone flying to them. Yes, you got it correct. A drone that you can eat. This is what claims a British company, Windhorse Aerospace. This company is developing a drone which can land at the prone areas and can be eaten later.
Parts of this edible drone can be made of anything that is edible like for example compressed vegetables or even a honeycomb. The edible drone is nothing but an unmanned pouncer, designed and manufactured for human welfare.
The company says that the drone will have a wingspan of nine feet. This would be big enough to let the shell serve as shelter. Next, the frame is designed to be used as fuel for cooking. And the contents provide food and water for dozens of people. The Drone has the ability to land within a roughly 25 foot target and launch from over 20 miles away. Talking about the power requirement of pouncer, it will get it from compressed air.
Why Edible Drone?
Typically, military planes fly over their target, open the back hatch and release parachutes attached to packaged food and supplies. However, this method can be wasteful, as airdrops do not always make it to their destination.
In March, the United Nations World Food Program aimed to drop 21 pallets of food to more than 200,000 Syrians. This happened in ISIS-besieged city of Deir ez-Zor, reports Air and space.
Unfortunately, the mission failed as four pallets were destroyed due to faulty parachutes. And seven landed too far away and 10 were never found. Hence, the company is trying their level best to work on all these issues, the company is expecting to test this drone in UK in the month of April. However if the idea succeeds, this would definitely be a novel and potentially life-saving way to deliver aid.
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