Tailing dams inspection

The goal of this project is to inspect tailings dams using drones. Tailing dams are impoundments that store waste by-products from mining. In West Virginia, most of the dams store by-products of coal. Failure of the embankment of the storage facility or spill from them can lead to catastrophic environmental and socioeconomic impacts since coal ash and tailings contain metals that can adversely affect the environment and human health. To prevent accidents, inspection is mandated by law. In this project, we try to increase the efficiency and precision of the inspection using data collected by autonomous drones. To reduce costs and increase safety, we use commercial drones, which are equipped with cameras and can be controlled by a remote computer. A video showing one of such drones inspecting a water dam is show in the video below. Future steps of this research include inspection of spillways, seepage detection, and automatic hazard detection.