High-Altitude Balloons Carry Wi-Fi Routers for Rapid Disaster Aid

Disasters frequently knock out communications infrastructures, isolating desperate people from the outside world. The internet would enable these people to contact rescuers - if an internet-to-ground linkage could be established. Aaron Ridley, a Michigan Engineering associate professor, is leading a team that is exploring the use of high-altitude balloons that can be launched within an hour of a disaster to carry Wi-Fi routers to positions above affected zones. The balloons would become platforms from which internet-to-ground signals could be sustained and controlled throughout emergencies. This kind of rapid response and reliable, real-time communications with first responders could mean the difference between life and death for otherwise helpless victims.

Transcript

00:00:00 [Music] [Applause] [Music] in the disaster Zone what you really want is the ability to communicate you want to enable people where there's no cell phone service cuz all the towers are dead you want them to be able to communicate with the outside world and internet is one way to do

00:00:21 that our primary goal is to test University Nano satellites to create ballooning that has the capability of producing internet to ground stations below so when communication infrastructure on the ground is diminished we can fly a high altitude balloon over the city and produce an internet signal for those in need we are going to be using zero

00:00:48 pressure balloons that become neutrally buyant at 120,000 ft we can fill up the balloon on the ground with a certain amount of helium with the certain size balloon that will give us a specific altitude that we want and at that altitude is where it'll have the calmest winds in order to give us the most long-term communication signal that we can produce 3 2 one go

00:01:17 step [Music] away once we have this sustainable platform under our control completely then we can use it for these zero pressure balloons and um beam internet down to the ground via Wi-Fi routers I would imagine in the earliest stages um of a disaster it would be the most important and that's one of the

00:01:44 beautiful things about this this project is that if you wanted to launch one in an hour or two we could be ready to go so if you were trapped inside of a building underneath Rubble or just needed help you could ping your location in real time First Responders would see that you need help all because of the communication uh and the Wi-Fi that we help produce through our balloon

00:02:10 infrastructure we're hoping that within a year to 18 months uh we'll be able to have a wireless system working we'll be able to have zero pressure balloon launches done routinely ballooning in near space environment has really skyrocketed um in the United States and we're trying to go somewhere that very few people have gone before to help out people around us in

00:02:40 these just terrible situations