Brazilian Helicopter Operator Helisul Becomes the First in the World to Roll out an AI-Enhanced Fleet
Helisul Aviation, the largest single turbine engines civil helicopter operator in Latin America, and Daedalean, the Switzerland-based developer of AI-based applications for situational awareness, announced today at the Helicopter Association International’s annual Heli-Expo that Helisul has selected Daedalean’s PilotEye traffic awareness system for its fleet.
Under the terms of the deal, Daedalean’s PilotEye – a traffic awareness system combining ADS-B with AI-enabled visual detection of non-cooperative traffic – will become the first AI-enabled system to be installed on an entire fleet of aircraft. Helisul will retrofit its Airbus As350 helicopters and will serve as Daedalean’s partner MRO serving all of LATAM for future installations and maintenance of the system.
Humberto Biesuz, Executive Superintendent of Helisul, said:Leveraging the best of innovative technology has always been at the heart of Helisul’s commitment to safety. We are proud to adopt Daedalean’s ground-breaking AI technology, and to become the first operator to feature the most advanced cockpit in the industry. We see great potential in using Daedalean’s pilot assistance systems to further enhance the safety of our operations.
Daedalean’s PilotEye – developed in collaboration with Avidyne – is a traffic awareness system on steroids. It merges ADS-B with real-time video footage fed from aircraft-mounted cameras into an onboard computer loaded with a neural network – Daedalean’s machine-learned model capable of recognizing all kinds of airborne hazards, including birds, drones, gliders, paragliders, and other traffic not equipped with transponders.
Currently, the system is progressing through the certification process with the US Federal Aviation Agency (FAA), with concurrent validation by the European Union Aviation Safety Agency (EASA). Daedalean will provide comprehensive support for the integration of its system into Helisul’s fleet as well as supporting the necessary steps for certification by the National Civil Aviation Agency of Brazil (Agência Nacional de Aviação Civil).
With this deal, Helisul becomes Daedalean’s launch customer of PilotEye, allowing the company to gain early experience with the system. Helisul will also be able to collect data in situations and environments specific to their use cases, such as search and rescue. This data will allow Daedalean to customize its algorithms to Helisul’s needs.
Dr. Yemaya Bordain, Daedalean’s President of the Americas, said:This agreement allows Daedalean to demonstrate the benefits of its technologies in the cockpit from day one. We are thrilled to contribute to the safety of Helisul’s real-world operations as well as to jointly develop the system further to create what we call Situational Intelligence, which is the ability of the system not only to recognize the environment but anticipate future risks. Through this collaboration, both Helisul and Daedalean stand to make great strides in safety in the skies.
This article was originally published by Daedalean.
