Bari is preparing for Drones Beyond 2022 which will take place on 20 and 21 October in the Fiera del Levante area. The event is organized by the Aerospace Technology District (Dta), the Municipality of Bari and the Puglia Region in collaboration with national and international organizations and companies.

The initiative is part of the medium-long term plan for the enhancement and development of a single infrastructure between Grottaglie and Bari, without excluding the possibility of generating a connection between the two nodes through an experimental “highway” for drones.

The Drones Beyond 2022 will take place in the Fiera del Levante area on 20 and 21 October, organized by the DTA, the Municipality of Bari and the Puglia Region in collaboration with national and international organizations and companies. The Drones Beyond aims to be a moment of presentation of challenges, products and solutions of UAM (Urban Air Mobility) to provide: an indication of the state of development of technologies and applications; a contribution to the important action of knowledge of the potential and utilities that they can generate, encouraging their acceptance and sharing; an acceleration of experimentation in real environments necessary to indicate and guide the removal of existing barriers to their full use.

The aim of the initiative is to support and accompany the industrial, scientific, economic and financial efforts of the aeronautical community by relating them to the need to create solutions that can be integrated into the future of cities and communities. The initiatives conducted to date by the DTA (Aerospace Technological District) have concerned both the extra-urban (Grottaglie airport) and urban (city of Bari) dimensions with the aim of presenting the two areas in an integrated range for the experimentation of new solutions of Advanced Air Mobility. The Drones Beyond is part of the medium-long term design of enhancement and development of a single infrastructure between Grottaglie and Bari without excluding the possibility of generating a connection between the two nodes over time through an experimental “highway” for drones.

The first edition of the DTA “Drones Beyond” project took place in September 2021 at the Grottaglie airport, as part of the international event MAM 2021. “Drones Beyond 2021 Operations” presented the Grottaglie airport and the surrounding areas, concrete examples of currently feasible solutions. The demonstrations covered various fields: from the presentation of new technologies to the exhibition of solutions that integrate their potential (manned and unmanned aircraft, satellite and terrestrial systems for observation and data acquisition, sensors, etc.) in various application fields.

The main objective of the 2022 appointment is the presentation, in the metropolitan city of Bari, of proposals and demonstrations of technological solutions and architectures (Sand box, Vertiporti / vertipad), of operational and use concepts (CONOPS, CONUSE), of missions and services able to develop interest in experimenting with new technologies and operational protocols, with particular reference to the theme of autonomous and semi-autonomous driving, the use of new generation communication / navigation technologies (5G, multilateral, satellite), with the use of Data Science techniques for data acquisition / manipulation (IoT, Cloud, A / I, Deep Learning) and for the development of solutions (Situation Awareness concept), in a perspective that sees Bari as a living lab on urban / metropolitan scale.

The event foresees the involvement of many operators, who will carry out demonstrations of technologies and services for the UAM in different operational scenarios, as well as other national and international actors as a presence at conferences and at the static exhibition, with the hope of involving and inspire new generations and new businesses.

The activities of Drones Beyond will cover the following areas:

• The conferences on urban mobility
• Demonstrations of operational missions in urban and metropolitan areas
• Space management
• Possible types of missions in the internal area of ​​the Fair (live during the day)
• Possible types of missions in urban / metropolitan areas (live / recorded in day and / or night environment)