Robo-Raptors Look and Fly Like Real Birds
There are plenty of robots out there that take a cue from nature. But the remote-controlled Robirds from Nico Nijenhuis of Clear Flight Solutions look like raptors and flap their wings like them too.
The robotic predatory birds could be used to scare off smaller birds from areas where they’re not desired, such as near airport runways, and around landfills and agricultural fields.
In initial field trials, Clear Flight Solutions claims that their Robirds reduced the number of nuisance bird populations by 50 percent or more and say that because mechanical predators resemble the real thing — particularly in wing movement and silhouette — they could potentially scare off all birds from a given area in the long term.
A peregrine falcon model has a body length up to 23 inches, a wingspan of 47 inches and is capable of reaching 50 mph. An eagle model has a body length nearly twice that of the falcon and a wingspan of 86 inches. It’s not messing around.
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SEP 2, 2014 04:52 PM ET //