Drone delivery of medicine in Rwanda

Rwanda remains a poor country, where many people continue to live without electricity nor clean running water, despite fast growth and much effort in recent years.  Yet the country delivers much needed medicine to remote corners by drones.

The government contracts a company, Zipline, to do that.  We visited the Muhanga site yesterday, to understand their operations.  It is actually not too difficult to understand the main ideas behind the operation.  But their achievement is still very impressive.  Not too many countries, even much richer ones, have done this. 

T=A catapult shoots the drone into the sky.  

The drone flies automatically to the destination, along a described route. At the destination, the cargo hold opens.  The package is dropped from the drone, and floats down to the ground, buffered by a simple but effective parachute. 

The drone flies back to the launch site, and is snagged from the sky on a wire.  

The drone is taken to the operation room, where it is filled with another package, and re-launched. 

Rwanda is a relatively small country.  Yet it is still 27 times the size of Hong Kong.  It takes several hours to drive critical medicine, such as blood for transfusion, to medical centres at remote places, where the roads may be difficult.  From a launch site at Muhanga in the west or Kayonza in the east, Medicine can be flown to any site in an hour. 

There are lots of technical, logistical, operational and financial problems to solve.  The battery the power the drone weights 9 kilograms.  The drones have to be piloted automatically.  The drone has to be light but robust.  The drone has to be snagged from the air with great precision, and safely.  How does a small company and a small achieve that?

That is partly what we want our students to learn.  How does a small, poor, developing country facing enormous challenges use and develop technology?  What are the lessons to the country, other similar countries, and ourselves?  We are going to take our students here, to see for themselves, to ask their own questions, to seek their own answers.  

That is part of the challenge, and joy, of service-learning.