YORK, Pa. — As the COVID-19 pandemic continues to grow, more companies are hoping to offer something to help in the fight. U-V equipped drones were mentioned as a possible way to disinfect large areas, but would that actually work? We talked to a Philadelphia-based tech company who put that theory to test.
“People wont feel comfortable in a seat that someone just sat in at the matinee and you’re coming in for the evening performance...so how do you sanitize that kind of environment which is very complex... you cant do it with ground robots, so you send in an aerial robot that can safely and comprehensively sanitize,” said Exyn Technologies Nader Elm.
Could an autonomous aerial robot really be an effective and efficient way to sanitize large public spaces like movie theaters or sports arenas to protect us from viruses? Elm said once the pandemic hit, he quickly decided to explore the option.
Knowing that UV-C light disrupts the virus, the Philadelphia-based team got to work creating a device the mounts the lights onto their aerial robot.
“What we found, though, was that this is impractical and doesn’t work. We can disinfect basically a seat, an area the size of a seat, but it takes 1 minute to disinfect that seat, so if you think of a movie theater with 300 seats, you know, you’ve lost an entire performance," said Elm.
Their results concluded that that while aerial drones are capable of hovering over and sanitizing a small area, the time and power required to sanitize large areas, make it an inefficient option at this time.
Their findings also suggest that an alternative method would be more efficient, which could include using a spray system rather than UV lights.