Chennai: when India pulls down for new measures to contain novel coronavirus outbreaks all over, Chhattisgarh capital Raipur introduces drones to tackle the scourge in Chhattisgarh capital Raipur with help of Chennai-based drone company.
Jayaprakash, 29, has created quite a splash in the international swimming pools to win medals for India. In his home state Tamil Nadu, he says, the government is doing pilot studies on spraying disinfectant with Garuda's drones on the Rajiv Gandhi Government General Hospital, as also Ripon Building that houses the Greater Chennai Corporation, and others.
The drone manufacturer has bagged orders from some private hospitals in Chennai for disinfecting their buildings as well, he added. The challenge before him is to reach Raipur with his drones and pilots amid the national lockdown.
The drones will spray disinfectant over 770 acres initially, they send two drones and two pilots by road. And in two days they hope to finish the spraying Jayaprakash says.
The total order he received is of Rs.2.3 crore for sanitiser spray across 180 sq km.
Interestingly, Jayaprakash was born with a lung ailment and will now be using drones to kill a virus that damages human lungs.
The business model is a sort of Drones as a Service (DAAS) which provides drones and the pilots to operate, the customer only has to provide the disinfectant.
A drone could cover 20 km distance compared to a human's 4-5 km within specific time and that a fleet of 300 drones can cover 6,000 km linear distance in a day.
Jayaprakash said that each drone can spray 40 litres of disinfectant every day, if deployed for 12 hours. The drones can fly up to a height of 400 ft and carry out spraying operations on even tall buildings.
As the company had used drones to spray pesticides on farm land, it occurred to him to use them to spray disinfectants also, he said.
Queried about the industry size in India, Jayaprakash said it is worth about $100 million and 15-20 organised players with all statutory licences.
According to him, officially there are about 16,000 drones in India.
