China's Chongqing UAV industry helps build smart life

CHONGQING, Sept. 11 (Xinhua) -- With a fuselage length of fewer than two meters, a flight time of four hours, and a maximum speed of 110 km per hour, the E25 unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) played a vital role in extinguishing a forest fire in southwest China's Chongqing Municipality in August.

Intelligent UAVs are now being used in many scenarios, especially in complex environments, which can effectively reduce labor costs and improve work efficiency, said Zheng Wei, general manager of Chongqing Efly Technology Co., Ltd, E25's manufacturer.

Zheng said their UAVs have independent intellectual property rights, widely used in forest fire prevention, emergency rescue, security inspection, and others.

Fitted with a camera and tracking module, the UAV can send back high-definition videos in real-time, identify targeted objects, and perform object tracking.

According to Zheng, the UAVs were used for searching for potential ignition points and conducting fire detection and residual fire monitoring during the forest fire.

Meanwhile, they also sent the on-site inspection videos back to the command center through the 5G network in real-time, providing accurate data analysis and emergency treatment plans for fire prevention and fighting at the front line.

China is a key civil UAV industrial base globally and boasted over 12,000 companies engaged in the UAV industry at the end of 2021, according to the 5th China International Unmanned Aircraft System Expo held in August.

Recently, Chongqing's Liangjiang New Area received approval to build a national-level civil UAV test area. The city is seizing this opportunity to attract upstream and downstream UAV enterprises to design application scenarios such as UAVs in urban logistics.

"Chongqing has complex terrain with high mountains and steep slopes. It's difficult to transport fresh agricultural products with high added value in mountainous areas to cities by road. This provides opportunities for UAV cargo delivery," said Zhan Xiangdong, chairman of Chongqing Liangjiang Aviation and Aerospace Industry Investment Group Co., Ltd.

In the field of the UAV industry, Liangjiang New Area has gathered leading enterprises in sub-sectors such as Fonair UAS Technologies Co., Ltd. and Chongqing Efly Technology Co., Ltd., according to local authorities.

The area also has operation guarantee conditions like general aviation airports and flight service stations, forming a relatively complete industrial chain.

"In the future, we will support enterprises to carry out operations such as integrated application of satellite internet and long-range UAVs, and vertical take-off and landing of UAV for cargo delivery in high mountains and valleys," said Zhan.