Drone Module Notifying Forest Fires from BİLGİ Students

Istanbul Bilgi University Electrical and Electronics Engineering Department students Erencan Avseren and Doğukan Engin have developed a 'drone module' that can detect and report forest fires when they start, as part of their graduation projects. Thanks to the module developed using artificial intelligence algorithms, it will be possible to intervene early in forest fires that have increased both in Turkey and in the world in recent years.

A fire detection module that can be integrated into drones has been developed for early intervention in forest fires that have increased in Turkey and around the world in recent years. Istanbul Bilgi University Electrical and Electronics Engineering Department students Erencan Avseren and Doğukan Engin's Dr. Instructor Thanks to the module developed using artificial intelligence algorithm under the consultancy of its member İpek Şen, drones can scan forest areas with a camera during flight, and when it detects smoke or fire in these areas, it can take a photo and send it to the fire crews' mobile phone with GPS data. It is aimed to prevent possible disasters that may occur with the rapid intervention of the teams to the correct coordinates.

Avseren and Engin said, “We trained the module with a dataset of forest fire images using a deep learning algorithm so that it can detect fire in the real-time image captured by the drone. In this way, the system we developed can detect smoke or fire during the flight and send both the photo of the fire area and the GPS data to the forest teams or to the individual mobile phones of the individuals. Since the module has a deep learning algorithm, it can be retrained on different subjects and can be used for different security systems in farms, homes and factories.

Stating that the tests of the project were completed successfully and they aim to establish an enterprise, Avseren and Engin said, “Forest fires have increased significantly both in our country and all over the world in recent years. Fires pose a significant risk to nature, living things and people's habitats. We think that our project will be very useful in preventing forest fires. In the coming period, we will contact the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry. We also want to apply to TÜBİTAK's Entrepreneurship Support Program BİGG to support our project.”