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<P><B><FONT face=Arial>Hi All:</B> </P>
<P>SARA Happenings is issued to foster communication within the Search and
Rescue community in Alberta. It is going to 226 e-mail addresses that are listed
as the primary contact of SAR Alberta member groups or which were requested to
be added to the mailing list.</P>
<P>Subscription and unsubscription information is at the end of the newsletter.
</P>
<P>
<HR>
</P><B>
<P>EDITOR’S WORD</P></B>
<P>Only one program oriented item this month – which first appeared in last
month’s newsletter.</P>
<P>I guess there’s not much SAR traffic right now, but it would be a good time
for groups to post their good news.</P>
<P>I did a short trawl of the Internet to come up with one item that may
interest SAR members. It’s after the only notice, below.</P>
<P>
<HR>
</P><B>
<P>OPERATION OCTOPUS</P></B>
<P>It’s official – Operation Octopus will be underway October 24th and
25<SUP>th</SUP>, 2009. Mark your calendar and plan to come for what proves to be
a great team building exercise – for your own local team as well as for the
greater SAR Alberta team. There will be fun, adventure and even food so plan to
attend so that we make this a great experience for all of us. We learn more from
each other in action than we ever could from a book.</P>
<P>Talk to your team so that you can RSVP basic numbers by October
1<SUP>st</SUP>. Put together some items from your club to be put in for a draw,
pack up your tent and be ready to roll! There will be camping available and some
meals, but we want this to be as much like a real search as possible some come
with that in mind and be ready and eager to meet new people and gain new ideas.
Let’s show Alberta what Search and Rescue is really about!</P>
<P>Any questions? Please feel free to contact Edward Van Heeren at </FONT><A
href="mailto:president@rockysar.com"><U><FONT face=Arial color=#0000ff><FONT
face=Arial color=#0000ff>president@rockysar.com</U></FONT></FONT></A><FONT
face=Arial> or look at the Rocky SAR website and feel free to contact SAR
Alberta. </P>
<P>
<HR>
</P><B>
<P>UNMANNED AERIAL VEHICLES.</P></B>
<P>The article I include is the abstract of a US National Science Foundation
Award to investigate using small UAVs in back country search and rescue
operations. I see the investigation was supposed to end last year – does anyone
know if it did or if it’s still ongoing?</P>
<P>I became interested in the topic some years ago when I did front end work in
the bush for geophysical exploration. While I could sometimes get a client to
spring for helicopter scouting there were many times when I wished for a small
ramp-launched eye-in-the sky to check out difficult terrain.</P>
<P>I visited a manufacturer of the early vehicles once in England. He built
small UAVs of the dimensions mentioned in the abstract – mostly used to provide
inconspicuous aerial observation for the police in Ireland. A thousand feet up
they were silent and invisible for all practical purposes. The problem of remote
piloting was an obstacle to me and I see the solution to that was part of this
investigation. </P>
<P></P>
<P>National Science Foundation Award #0534736 </P>
<P></P>
<P></P>
<P>UAV-Enabled Wilderness Search and Rescue: A Human-Centered Approach</P>
<P></P>
<P>Investigator(s): Michael Goodrich (PI) ; Timothy McLain (Co-PI) ; Bryan Morse
(Co-PI)</P>
<P>Sponsor: Brigham Young University, UT 84602 8014226177</P>
<P>Start Date/Expiration Date 2005-11-01 to 2008-10-31 (amended 2005-11-08)</P>
<P>Awarded Amount to Date: $501,426</P>
<P>Abstract: Wilderness search and rescue (WSAR) is the task of finding and
giving assistance to humans who are lost or injured in mountain, desert, lake,
river, or other remote settings. Because of the vast distances involved in
wilderness settings, searchers frequently depend on surveillance from
helicopters and small airplanes. Although these resources are very useful for
searchers, the have limitations: resources consume considerable cost, there can
be delays between when the resources are needed and when they arrive, ground
searchers and pilots must overcome communications barriers between them, and the
aircraft may not be able to provide low level imagery because of flying
restrictions associated with rugged terrain. The central hypothesis of this
project is that mini (3-5 foot wing spans), fixed wing Unmanned Aerial Vehicles
(UAVs) can be used by WSAR personnel to efficiently find people in the
wilderness. The human factors issues associated with small UAVs are much
different than those associated with large UAVs, mostly because small UAVs for
WSAR personnel imply limitations on operator training, sensor capacity, autonomy
capability, and flight time. The PI's plan is to develop operator interfaces and
UAV autonomy for WSAR systems that allow people without RC-piloting skills to
search an area, using either online or offline approaches. When working online,
the PI will adopt a non-pilot operator perspective and design autonomy to allow
operators working in an "augmented virtuality" environment to "guide the camera"
rather than fly the UAV. In situations where information from a UAV's video is
to be recorded and used in offline information retrieval and analysis, the PI
will pursue an active mosaic approach in which video images are overlaid on
terrain maps. The PI will employ a strongly human-centered approach in all
phases of the project, both for creating the WSAR systems and for evaluating
them, in which expertise from researchers in human-robot interaction, computer
vision, controls, and artificial intelligence is integrated. User studies will
include field tests with WSAR personnel, investigation of current work practice
in WSAR teams, usefulness of active mosaicing for offline and online searches,
and so on. Broader Impacts: Each year, many people are lost or find themselves
in jeopardy while hiking, boating/kayaking, skiing, fishing, etc. Each year,
wilderness search and rescue consumes thousands of person-hours and hundreds of
thousands of dollars in Utah alone. With each hour that passes between the time
that a person is lost and WSAR people find the victim, the effective search
radius grows by approximately 3km. Each hour spent in the water or lost in the
woods decreases the likelihood of a successful rescue. A portable UAV with
appropriate interfaces, autonomy, and sensor processing at an affordable price
should decrease the amount of time required between when searchers arrive at a
scene and the time when aerial surveillance is present to support their efforts.
Such a system would increase the probability of successful rescue.</P>
<P>NSF Org: IIS - Division of Information & Intelligent Systems</P>
<P>Award Number: 0534736</P>
<P>Award Instrument: Standard Grant</P>
<P>Program Manager: Ephraim P. Glinert</P>
<P>IIS Division of Information & Intelligent Systems</P>
<P>CSE Directorate for Computer & Information Science & Engineering</P>
<P>NSF Program(s): HUMAN COMPUTER INTER PROGRAM</P>
<P>Field Application(s): Human Subjects, Information Systems</P>
<P>Program Reference Code(s): BASIC RESEARCH & HUMAN RESORCS, 9218</P>
<P>COLLABORATIVE SYSTEMS, 7496</P>
<P>Program Element Code(s): 6845</P>
<P></P>
<P>Downloaded from – </FONT><A
href="http://www.sciencestorm.com/award/0534736.html"><U><FONT face=Arial
color=#0000ff><FONT face=Arial
color=#0000ff>http://www.sciencestorm.com/award/0534736.html</U></FONT></FONT></A><FONT
face=Arial> </P>
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<P><B>SARA HAPPENINGS SUBMISSIONS </P></B>
<P>Our regular publication date for mailings of SARA Happenings is the middle of
each month. Please note that the deadline for material is the 14<SUP>th</SUP> of
each month. </P>
<P align=center></P>
<P>Does your group have an event posting for the SARA Happenings mailing? If so,
please send information 1-1/2 months prior to the dates you wish advertised. It
will then give ample time for those reading it to respond. </P>
<P>Please send all material to the editor; Chris Hoare at </FONT><A
href=""><U><FONT face=Arial color=#0000ff><FONT face=Arial
color=#0000ff>choare@shaw.ca</U></FONT></FONT></A><FONT face=Arial> PLEASE DO
include contact information for members to gain further information.</P>
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