FEBRUARY 2021 | 1ST PRESS RELEASE
Expertise of 17 renowned project partners supported by 8 cross industry advisory board members will be leveraged to demonstrate advanced U-Space services enabling the highest possible operational safety level. These include Detect-And-Avoid as-a-service, dynamic geofencing and air traffic prioritization rules. Five drone platforms (passenger eVTOL, Hydrogen fuel cell VTOL, AED medical drone, X8 medical transport and tiltwing VTOL drone) will be combined with manned aviation in operational exercises validating technology in real urban environment. The demonstration results will be further virtually enhanced through large-scale simulations in order to evaluate the maximum airspace capacity of the given locations. The demonstrations will take place in collaboration with hospitals and public space areas of the cities of Antwerp (BE), Aachen (DE), Heerlen (NL) and Maastricht (NL), leveraging the MAHHL trans-border region. The project results will then be further validated by simulating demonstrations in two additional locations in Europe, namely Athens, Greece (South EU) and Prague, Czech Republic (Central EU). Prior to the operational environment demonstrations, a de-risking exercise at the DronePort BVLOS test-facility (BE) will take place. All lessons learnt from the project will be documented in a Performance Assessment and Recommendations report, which will include refinements to the current U-space architecture principles, proposals for improved operational procedures and mechanisms for an effective interface with Air Traffic Control (ATC) and U-Space service providers and a suggestion of a set of Urban Air Mobility indicators to complement the existing Smart Urban Mobility Indicators used by European cities. The results of the SAFIR-Med project will enable European cities to get acquainted with their role in U-space management, to keep up with relevant regulatory changes, to include Urban Air Mobility in their urban development agendas and to start using the technology for the benefit of their citizens. To achieve this, for the next two years SAFIR-Med will collaborate with representatives from the entire Urban Air Mobility value chain as either project partners (ANSP/ATC, USSP, Operator, UAS Manufacturers, cities) or advisory board members (public authorities including cities, healthcare actors, technology & service providers). The SAFIR-Med project partners are: Helicus – Belgium Future Needs Management Consulting – Cyprus Skeyes – Belgium Unifly – Belgium AgentFly Technologies – Czechia Hellenic U-Space Institute – Greece SkeyDrone – Belgium Droniq – Germany NSX – Belgium INVOLI – Switzerland RWTH Aachen University, Institute of Flight System Dynamics – Germany flyXDrive – Germany TUDelft, MAVlab – Netherlands HyFly – Netherlands SABCA – Belgium Ehang Europe – France City of Aachen – Germany The SAFIR-Med advisory board members are: EASA (European Aviation Safety Agency) The Red Cross Baloise Insurance Zuyderland (healthcare group) Droneport (BVLOS test centre for unmanned aviation) Proximus (Telecom Operator) City of Antwerp Port of Antwerp The SAFIR-Med project kick-off meeting took place on 28th of January 2021. Over the following months project news, publications and outputs will be available on the official project webpage at www.safir-med.eu and distributed via the project social media channels on LinkedIn and Twitter @SAFIRmedEU . The project has received recognition and funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under Grant Agreement No 101017701 under the topic “SESAR-VLD2-03-2020: U-space capabilities and services to enable Urban Air Mobility”.
Keywords
drones, health, urban air mobility, HORIZON2020, H2020, SESARJU