UAH Drone Fly Day at Sparkman High School kicks off PILOT engineering collaboration

A small drone buzzed fast loops way above the Sparkman High School football field. A larger one precisely delivered a water-bottle payload to an end zone in a rescue simulation. Amid a pep rally vibe complete with the marching band, engineers and students from The University of Alabama in Huntsville (UAH) Rotorcraft Systems Engineering and Simulation Center (RSESC) gave a glimpse of what their aircraft can do.

Drone Fly Day on Aug. 8 kicked off PILOT (Performance and Integration in the Logistical Operation of uncrewed Transport), a new collaboration between Sparkman and UAH, a part of The University of Alabama System. Approximately 1,500 students from Sparkman High and Sparkman and Monrovia middle schools attended.

“We need an engineering program, and UAH is the engineering school,” said Sparkman teacher Scott Coonfare, who contacted RSESC about his goal of bringing engineering education to Sparkman and other schools in the Madison County system. “We’re trying to get more STEM (science, technology, engineering and math) classes and more students excited about the engineering processes.”

UAH shares that goal and hopes to achieve a couple more through the program, said David Hatfield, RSESC deputy director.

“First, we’re very interested in cultivating the students in STEM and then, second, in UAH and then, third, in our center – in that order. We employ UAH students to help us do some of our work. Hopefully, we’ll be able to get some of these kids interested, and they may show up over here at UAH as students that we hire in the process.”

Jerry Hendrix, RSESC director, offered students a direct invitation during the package-delivery portion of the demonstration. He described potential commercial applications of drone technology as well as some of its current limitations.

“It’s a problem you could help solve,” he said, “if you come to UAH.”

Coonfare called the drone exhibition “an excellent way to build interest and firmly establish the ground floor of the program.”

His plan for PILOT includes three phases over the next three academic years:

• Phase One, 2024-2025 – Teams of Sparkman High students build drones and learn how to fly them with supervision and assistance from UAH engineers, who set benchmarks – including a safety plan – and judge a flying competition in February.
• Phase Two, 2025-2026 – Sparkman High students improve drone design and construction and incorporate computer programming. Phase One moves into Sparkman Ninth Grade School and Sparkman and Monrovia middle schools.
• Phase Three, 2026-2027 – Sparkman High adds a college-level class focusing on aerospace engineering and continues the Phase Two class. Phase One expands into elementary schools.

To fund materials for the first year, Sparkman applied for a grant from the Association of Uncrewed Vehicle Systems International (AUVSI) and received $2,500 to buy five drone kits, one for each team.

Hendrix, who is president of the local AUVSI chapter, encouraged students to attend the upcoming AUVSI Pathfinder Symposium, set for Aug. 26-28 at the Von Braun Center.

RSESC at UAH conducts research on behalf of the aerospace community in Huntsville and in the nation, focusing on advanced solutions, systems engineering, systems integration and simulations. For more information, call 256-824-6807 or email rsesc-admin@uah.edu.