This section is dedicated to a series of applied AI initiatives that AI for People has kickstarted. These are aimed at furthering the mission to use AI technology for the real needs of society and for the people living in it.
Intelligent Drone Swarm for Search and Rescue Operations at Sea
by Vincenzo Lomonaco, Angelo Trotta, Marta Ziosi, Juan de Dios Yáñez Ávila, Natalia Díaz-Rodríguez
In recent years, a rising numbers of people arrived in the European Union, traveling across the Mediterranean Sea or overland through Southeast Europe in what has been later named as the European migrant crisis. In the last 5 years, more than 16 thousands people have lost their lives in the Mediterranean sea during the crossing. The United Nations Secretary General Strategy on New Technologies is supporting the use of Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Robotics to accelerate the achievement of the 2030 Sustainable Development Agenda, which includes safe and regular migration processes among the others. In the same spirit, the central idea of this project aims at using AI technology for Search And Rescue (SAR) operations at sea. In particular, we propose an autonomous fleet of self-organizing intelligent drones that would enable the coverage of a broader area, speeding-up the search processes and finally increasing the efficiency and effectiveness of migrants rescue operations.