By Skies Magazine | June 8, 2023 Estimated reading time 5 minutes, 10 seconds.
Aircraft manufacturer Diamond Aircraft announced on June 6 a new variant of its flagship special mission aircraft, the DA62 MPP, specifically designed for environmental surveillance missions. In partnership with Overwatch Imaging and Trakka Systems, Diamond has equipped its DA62 MPP (multi-purpose platform) aircraft with a multi-mission sensor mix — featuring Overwatch Imaging’s AI-driven WAMI (wide-area, multi-domain mapping and ISR) sensor, TK-8, and Trakka Systems’ EO/IR (electro-optical, infrared) camera, TC300.
The new aircraft variant, dubbed the DA62 MPP Vanguard, will be showcased for the first time at this year’s Paris Air Show, to be held from June 19 to 25 in Le Bourget, France.
Based on the DA62 MPP — a twin-engine aircraft with a range of over 1,000 nautical miles and a fuel burn of approximately nine gallons per hour — the DA62 MPP Vanguard boasts a unique configuration that caters to customers seeking an airborne environmental surveillance platform that has low operating costs and can be adapted for various missions. Thanks to its advanced software, the aircraft is ideally suited for applications such as automated fire mapping, vegetation analyses, flood mapping, wildlife monitoring, oil spill mapping, 3D modeling, as well as border security and search-and-rescue (SAR) missions.
With the TK-8 sensor, which incorporates five spectral bands (RGB, NIR, SWIR, LWIR, and MWIR), anomalies can be detected and interpreted using artificial intelligence (AI) control, with results delivered in real-time to the operator in the aircraft or decision-makers on the ground, Diamond said. In critical situations like forest fires, fire sources and histories can be analyzed and mapped to prevent further escalation, and forest health can be monitored for proactive prevention.
“We’re honored to be selected by Diamond Aircraft to support the Vanguard configuration of the impressive DA62 MPP,” said Greg Davis, founder and CEO of Overwatch Imaging. “Overwatch Imaging has a proven track record of supporting time-critical detection and monitoring roles for users who depend on accurate, timely, and automated airborne intelligence for missions that matter around the world. We’re proud to continue that tradition in partnership with Diamond Aircraft and its customers.”
The TK-8 sensor addresses the limitations of human-intensive imaging systems, which require highly trained and alert observers who are tasked with locating small objects in vast and challenging environments. “This manual method of airborne searching can be inefficient, ineffective, labor-intensive, and time consuming,” noted Diamond.
The Trakka TC300 camera, which has a 360-degree field of view, complements the TK-8 sensor by enabling the operator in the aircraft to closely monitor situations on the ground.
“Trakka Systems is proud to be a partner of Diamond Aircraft and excited to support the monitoring of global environmental changes,” said Adam Boniecki, business development manager at Trakka Systems. “The TC-300 allows for easy integration with other mission critical systems, like the Overwatch system and other AI technologies in this vein. These partnerships strive to bring cutting-edge solutions that represent just a glimpse of the ongoing advancement in airborne surveillance.”
During the summer of 2022, the DA62 MPP embarked on a North American tour, where Diamond hoped to showcase the aircraft’s suitability as a cost-effective platform for the airborne law enforcement market. Now, as global climate change is affecting environmental behaviors, the DA62 MPP Vanguard fulfils a growing need for a capable and efficient environmental surveillance platform.
