Discovering underwater hazards

Problem

Surveying critical infrastructure above and below water is an important need for site surveys, construction, and ongoing inspection. Currently, multiple surveys are needed due to lack of continuity between surveying methods when mapping above and below the water surface. In addition, limitations of current inspection methods and the unique challenges of measuring in dynamic shallow waters, infrastructure in riverine and near-shore environments are often un-surveyed leaving hazards unmapped. 

Solution

ASTRALite developed the first ever 2-in-1 scanning topo-bathy LIDAR on a UAV that can seamlessly survey and map with a single survey. This system provides previously unavailable and highly desired 3D data from a platform capable of reaching inaccessible and hard to map areas. In addition, the output can be viewed in real-time giving the customer immediate visibility of cracking, misalignment, settlement, erosion and undermining of slabs and foundation elements to a revolutionary 1 cm accuracy or better. The underlying technology was originally developed in Prof. Jeffrey Thayer’s lab and was licensed and patented by ASTRALite.

Market Application

Additional applications include military logistics, natural disaster assessment and recovery, risk assessment for industrial mining or oil and gas retention ponds, and water resource management. Recent demonstrations with the United States Geological Survey (USGS) and at the University of Hawaii Applied Research Lab, proved the system can be flown on widely-available commercial UAVs capable of carrying 5kg payloads (e.g., DJI Matrice 600 Pro).

What's Next?

What's Next? ASTRALiTe is seeking investment capital for final product design, production and distribution.