In the cities of the future, important life-saving operations will arrive from the sky. The Universities of Modena and Reggio Emilia and Bologna concluded a project in May that uses drones for the urgent transport of blood in city areas. This is a new line of research for our region, which has the aim of providing a safe and high-performance air transport system for biological material (organs, blood, other urgent biological material) in the Modena area, innovative and sustainable to operate in aerial medical field within urban contexts, where in most cases helicopters are not able to intervene.
The proposal does not aim to completely replace the use of air ambulances, but it may be an excellent candidate for safely transporting medical equipment, organs, supplies and biological material, considerably decreasing the environmental impact of air medical services. The project is headed by Professor Francesco Leali, who received funding of around 80 thousand euros made available by the University and the Modena Foundation.
Professor Leali, since drone transport is nothing new, why this project?
“Transport with drones in itself is not new, but it is one of the rare experiments that take place within cities because it is a very delicate topic. In this case we had to speak with Anac, with Enac, we had to develop all ad hoc skills. The idea is to study, in the context of Urban Air Mobility, a system that allows organic material to be transported in safe conditions, for example between two hospitals, two points”.
Urban Air Mobility, what is it?
“Urban mobility in the air is a very hot topic at the moment and occupies that area between automotive and aerospace, therefore, automotive technologies that can be used for aerospace and vice versa. There is also a lot of interest in the Region. In Turin there is already a very strong district in Italy.” Why did you start from the transport of blood?
“The transport of blood could obviously also be extended to organs. We have not used organs because from an experimentation point of view it would require many more authorizations.”
What distances can be covered with the drone?
“It could reach up to 30 kilometers.”
Alberto Greco
