Heat-resistant Swiss drones to protect firefighters

Heat-resistant drone to protect firefighters Keystone-SDA

A new Swiss drone that can withstand temperatures of up to 200°C will fly into burning buildings and send firefighters live images directly from the danger zones.

+Get the most important news from Switzerland in your inbox

The “Firedrone” thus reduces the risk for emergency services, the Swiss Federal Laboratories for Materials Science and Technology (EMPA) said on Monday. “Today, firefighters have to enter burning buildings themselves in order to localise hazardous materials or missing people,” explained developer Fabian Wiesemüller in the press release.

The drone is therefore intended for use in large and complex buildings such as industrial halls, multi-storey car parks or tunnels, where searching is particularly dangerous for people. Another area of application is inspections in industrial plants such as cement or steelworks, which could be carried out at high temperatures without long and costly cooling phases.

+ The perils of training to fight fire

While conventional drones fail at around 40°C, the “Firedrone” can fly at temperatures of up to 200°C. The electronics are protected by insulation made from a new type of polyimide aerogel. This lightweight material encases the sensitive components and is supplemented by an internal temperature management system.

Equipped with an infrared camera, the drone sends thermal images to the emergency services in real time. This allows the incident command team, for example, to gain an overview from a safe distance before personnel enter a building. As there is often no GPS signal available indoors, the drone has special localisation systems.

+ Warfare rewired: drones and civilian risk

The new flying robot was developed at EMPA. It is now being continued by a subsidiary of EMPA and the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Lausanne (EPFL).

The start-up has already tested the drone on the grounds of the Andelfingen training centre and in a cement plant. In the long term, the system is to be supplemented by a mobile docking and maintenance station that can be integrated into fire engines.

Adapted from German by AI/ts

How we work 

We select the most relevant news for an international audience and use automatic translation tools to translate them into English. A journalist then reviews the translation for clarity and accuracy before publication.  

Providing you with automatically translated news gives us the time to write more in-depth articles. The news stories we select have been written and carefully fact-checked by an external editorial team from news agencies such as Bloomberg or Keystone.

If you have any questions about how we work, write to us at [e-mail]