SkySensus chosen for Canada’s RPAS traffic management trial

SkySensus has announced that it has been chosen for Canada’s RPAS traffic management trial to commercialize beyond visual line of sight (BVLOS) drones for future use. The trial will take place in partnership with UTM provider Unifly.

The UTM selection committee lead by Transport Canada and NAV CANADA was created to develop a roadmap for integrating drones into Canadian airspace.

SkySensus being awarded for the trials means it will bring its expertise, experience, and technology components to enable safe BVLOS drone flights.

Laurent Huenaerts, VP and general manager at Unifly Inc, said:

The vision and concrete implementation plan that SkySensus defined to enable complex operations will benefit not only Transport Canada and NAV CANADA, but also every RPAS operator willing to fly BVLOS in Canada in the future.

The unmanned traffic management (UTM) system will be required to track, remotely identify, detect and avoid, and resolve conflicts, all on the fly, to ensure drones and human-crewed aircraft don’t come into contact with one another during a flight.

The current aim of the trail is to eventually roll out the UTM system around Canada to integrate drones into the airspace safely, effectively, and efficiently. This will also allow for beyond visual line of sight (BVLOS) and more complex drone flights.

Blair Boyd, SkySensus program manager at Peraton Canada, said:

This is a significant win for SkySensus. To be singled out by the selection committee to contribute to the RTM trials is immense for SkySensus and the entire RPAS community. The RTM services trials complement our current project focus on the BVLOS enablers of airworthiness, detect and avoid solutions and data analytics, all toward the development for safe RPAS operations to enable commercialization.

SkySensus has already completed the first phase of the trials consisting of several simultaneous flights last month at the Foremost UAS Test Range in southern Alberta. Key data was collected from the flight and is now being analyzed before phase two of testing begins in spring 2021.

Photo: Unifly & Josh Spires