Mumbai: Once again after a gap of five months, the aerospace engineering department of IIT-Bombay has rocketed into higher orbits, this time in a global competition held last week at Agra. The organisers included the US department of defence.

It was the first US-Asian event which aimed to demonstrate and assess micro- aerial vehicle and unmanned ground vehicle technology. Held between March 10 and 15, 2008, there were 12 contenders—four from India and eight from abroad. Earlier in October 2007, the aerospace engineering department had won a micro-aerial vehicle national competition held at Agra.

Apart from the US department of defence, the other organisers this time were the Bangalore-based National Aerospace Laboratory (Nal) and the Defence Research and Development Organisation. The four contestants from India were NAL, Drone Aerospace, IIT Bombay and ABES College of Engineering at Ghaziabad in UP.

   Speaking to TOI on Wednesday, Hemandra Arya of the aerospace engineering department and team leader, said that the competition involved rescuing hostages who were trapped in a building.

   “In this simulated scenario, which took place in a one km by one km area, the hostages were caught in a bank building and our task was to rescue them. The commandos had to be dispatched from a point which was a kilometre away from the building,’’ Arya said. The zone between the area, where the commandos began their operations and the building, was mined and barricaded.

   Arya said that the role of the micro aerial and ground vehicles was to guide the commandos to the building. “We (IIT Bombay) developed a 30-cm fixed wing aircraft which was equipped with a video camera. It can be used for surveillance purposes. In addition, we also developed a 30-cm hovering vehicle with four rotors which can be used for monitoring an area on a continuous basis. We also had a ground vehicle which had the capability to follow a designated path. All three of them operated autonomously,’’ he said.

   The equipment, which stole the show, was the hovering vehicle developed by Arya and his team. It is powered by electricity, can hover for 15 minutes and fly up to one km. There was no prize, only recognition by way of a certificate.

   Of the five members of the Mumbai group, three were from IIT, one was an aeromodeller and another was a robotic expert.

 [Publication: Times of India Mumbai; Date:2008 Mar 20; Section:Times City; Page Number: 10]