solution

Based on the scenario that follows, develop a full use case description, showing the pilot and the
drone’s on-board system. (16)

The ACM Communications report at the end of 2019 that a high-value commodity that makes a lot of economic
sense to deliver via drone is medicine, also known as “leapfrog”, technology.
The market need is clear: when it comes to perishable medical samples or life-saving vaccines, time is of the
essence, and few technologies are better at traversing crowded or hard-to-reach areas than aerial drones. This is
so true for the rural areas of KwaZulu-Natal.
As a pilot study, the Ngwelezane Hospital is used as a hub to distribute medicines to remote areas in the close
vicinity using drones. When the nurse at a clinic makes a diagnosis that needs emergency medication, she
immediately reports to the administration assistant who will send a text message to Ngwelezane Hospital Services
(NHS). The text message will contain information about the patient, the diagnosis, and of course supporting facts
of the emergency. The clinic personnel are structured in such a way that the nurse can be seen as a type of
administration assistant, because she can diagnose patients as well as in certain cases send messages to NHS.
Of course, the administration assistant is not allowed to diagnose patients, although she is a qualified nurse.
When the Hospital Services receives the message, they inform and authorises the drone pilot for the flight. The
pilot will do a pre-flight check on the drone, and as part of this check, he always checks the weather conditions.
When, during the flight, the drone experiences problems, the pilot will take over manually, and so will override the
automated functions to ensure the safe delivery and return of the drone. Unfortunately, even during this manual
override, pilots will sometimes suffer from pilot fatigue, and as such, becomes a risk. Whenever this happens,
counter measures have to be taken, like asking assistance from other pilots, as an example.
Part of the use case “Pre-flight Check”, the pilot will initialise the settings (via the drone’s interface), and the
drone/controller will validate the initial settings. After validation, the pilot will initialise the mapping sequences and
at the same time the supervisor will load and secure the load.
When that’s done, the drone will run the auto-mapping sequence. It will check the traced path, and if the path has
any unexplored areas, the drone will re-run the auto-mapping settings. Otherwise it will update the controller
settings. It then will inform the pilot of completion and the status of the mapping sequence. The pilot will then shut
down the system via the interface.