CU-Boulder to Create UAS Lightning Detection Sensor



By Danielle Lucey



Benjamin Franklin’s famous key and kite experiment is getting a 21st century update, thanks to a newly funded project out of the University of Colorado Boulder that will create an instrument that can detect the electric field changes that measure lightning strikes. 



The university’s College of Engineering and Applied Science was given support by the Jonathan Merage Foundation, which had previously funded UC-Boulder’s work on the VORTEX2 tornado research project. 



This round of funding will go toward a new SUV for the school that will allow researchers to storm chase with the help of the school’s 15-pound Tempest fixed-wing UAS, which will be scouting locations for lightning strikes. The SUV will serve as a Wi-Fi node for the UAS, which will serve as a radio tether and keep operations line of sight but still nomadic. 



“This new equipment will allow CU-Boulder College of Engineering and Applied Science students to participate in a truly unique and revolutionary approach to lightning research,” says Brian Argrow, a professor of aerospace engineering at CU-Boulder. 



The project has three phases, starting with a baseline analysis and integration of the systems. It will then move onto flight tests and wrap up with deployment of UAS into thunderstorms in 2015.