Drone Survey & Mapping

At Orbital we use various drones such as DJI Phantom 4 RTK, eBee X and SQ. The eBee SQ is an advanced Agricultural Drone that takes professionals such as crop consultants, growers and researchers from drone to action, simply and efficiently. The eBee SQ can fly for up to 55 minutes on a single battery charge. This performance enables it to cover up to 500 acres in a single flight at 120 Metres above ground level - up to 10 times more ground than small quadcopter drones - for extremely efficient crop monitoring and analysis. The result is fewer flights per project, for less time spent collecting field data and more time acting on it e.g. analysis and processing. Also read more about LiDAR UAVs and Thermal Imaging UAVs as well as Drone Mapping and Image Processing Workflows.

Arguably, using Drones will lead to a large increase in the amount of physical data being collected, this does mean an increase in office time spent processing and utilizing this data. However, this expansion is canceled out many times over by the huge time savings a drone produces out in the field. Many of senseFly’s surveying customers say, for example, that large jobs that once took weeks can now be completed in just a few days, and that a week’s worth of traditional data collection is now achieved in just one day. Last but not least, less time spent on the ground means staff safety is improved by minimizing risk to surveying teams when measuring sites such as mines, unstable slopes and transport routes. Simply choose take-off and landing locations that are out of harm’s way.

Orbital Africa has successfully carried out many Drone/UAV Mapping projects in Kenya and Africa region at large. Recently, we conducted drone mapping project in a 17-acre parcel of land in Kiambu County. The outputs of the project was a 3cm resolution Orthomosaic, a DEM, DSM and Contours. The sample Orthomosaic can be viewed here: >>Kiambu Drone Project.

Photo Gallery

Here, you can view More Photos.. of the project.

Drone regulations and use in Kenya has been intricate for quite sometime now. Apparently, from the latest developments, it appears like the government has flexed its muscles on UAV ownership and operations in Kenya. So, The government of Kenya has approved the Drone Ownership and Operations.

When choosing a right drone for a particular assignment, one of the first questions that you must ask yourself is whether you need a multi-rotor or fixed wing drone. Both multi-rotor and fixed wing drones have a niche of pros and cons that make them better suited for specific uses, so it’s imperative to comprehend the key differences between both types before acquiring one. Therefore, before purchasing a drone, you need to consider some of the following factors: Comparing a Fixed-wing and a Multi-rotor Drone