Let's take a break from building for a moment to see what is emerging in the wider world, away from the UK where ~ despite having the longest coastline in Europe ~ things move at a much slower pace, if at all. The best description I've come across for our governance here is that we operate a 'Butler Economy', principally designed to provide services which cater for the rich and connected to managing their wealth.
Almost invariably the leading edge of drone development springs from places like the US and China instead, and the submarine drone that we saw at the expo in Shenzen is, it appears, not as new an idea as we thought. The pic on the right is of the 'Naviator', initially begun as a student proj twelve years ago and developed sufficiently far enough for the US Navy to consider deploying them in places like the Taiwan Strait if it all kicks off thereabouts.
On the left, the 'Saildrone' developed (where else?) in California for surveillance at sea and most recently deployed by Danes to deter people from 'accidentally' cutting undersea cables by the reckless use of an anchor.
'Many people said to me that both air and water operation was not possible.'
...which was said not by me, but by the lead developer at Navigator in New Jersey, whilst in fact I found that airscrews work passably well in water wholly by accident.
Key takeaways from this are the gestation period: the Naviator having taken a full twelve years to develop to the point that the US Navy might want to include a fleet in their inventory. And how, watching the video, drone motors appear as happy to operate at around 100 r.p.m. submerged as they are at several thousand in the air?
Such questions ~ aside from driving a truck in order to pay the bills ~ are what get us out of bed each morning.
