IIT Guwahati alumni develop drones for spraying disinfectants in public spaces

Drones can fight COVID fast & safe

GUWAHATI: A start-up, Marut Dronetech Private Limited, founded by IIT Guwahati alumni has developed and deployed drones for spraying disinfectants in public spaces to prevent Coronavirus. To control COVID-19 situation, drones have proved to be of great use as seen in countries like China and South Korea.

Marut Dronetech is working with the Government of Telangana and departments across the State to deploy drones for public safety applications. Recently, Karimnagar Municipal Corporation, Telangana, had deployed customized drones of Marut Drones for spraying disinfectants in the Mukarampur area of Karimnagar where 10 Indonesians and one local had tested positive for COVID-19. Disinfectants were also sprayed at district collectorate, municipal corporation, district hospital, bus station, auto stand, markets, police commissionerate and Rythu bazars.

In a given time, it is seen that drones disinfect 50 times more area than traditional methods and can keep human operators out of harm. Thus, they prove to be efficient, avoids any cross-infection and stops the spread of a pandemic.

Marut drones have also developed public monitoring and warning drones which are fitted with a camera and speaker. These can be used by personnel to monitor places especially with high disease prevalence for crowd gathering and give appropriate instructions, using fitted loudspeakers, to people. As this is much faster than regular patrolling operations, it can be very efficient not only for patrolling but also to spread the message. These drones can be used in places where people are still seen moving around streets and government personnel are having a hard time implementing a strict lockdown.

To limit the risk of the personnel getting infected while conducting the temperature checks, drones equipped with infrared cameras to test temperature measurements can be used. While these kinds of drones are commonly used for public safety operations or inspections, with proper calibration, these drones can instead help measure body temperature.

Drones can be used to deliver medicines and other critical supplies to reduce unnecessary human contact. It also speeds up the process significantly. During a recent trial, it was observed that a drone covered a distance of 12 km in 8 minutes, which is 80 times faster than traditional delivery. This has been stated in a press release.

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