{"id":12295,"date":"2012-09-30T19:00:43","date_gmt":"2012-09-30T09:00:43","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/southburnett.com.au\/news2\/?p=12295"},"modified":"2024-07-17T16:28:47","modified_gmt":"2024-07-17T06:28:47","slug":"can-anyone-find-outback-joe","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/southburnett.com.au\/news2\/2012\/09\/30\/can-anyone-find-outback-joe\/","title":{"rendered":"Can Anyone Find Outback Joe?"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>
Canberra UAV team, from left, Michael Fagan, team manager Stephen Dade, Andrew Tridgell, Matthew Ridley and Ron Graham at Kingaroy Airport<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"\"<\/a>
‘Outback Joe’ takes a rest while awaiting rescue<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

September 30, 2012<\/strong><\/p>\n

Outback Joe’s all set to go missing … but never fear, the UAVs are here!<\/p>\n

This is the fifth time that Joe’s gone missing somewhere near Kingaroy, and the fifth time that unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) have been despatched from around the world to find him.<\/p>\n

That’s probably why some people would say “Outback Joe” is a real dummy…<\/strong><\/p>\n

A total of 23 teams will be competing in the 2012 Outback Challenge which gets under way at Kingaroy Airport tomorrow (Monday).<\/p>\n

In the Search and Rescue Challenge<\/strong>\u00a0teams must launch aircraft capable of searching a four square mile area, up to five nautical miles from Kingaroy Airport.<\/p>\n

The “target” is a \u00a0dummy (that’s “Outback Joe”) positioned “in a typical resting pose in a rural setting”.<\/p>\n

The GPS co-ordinates of the search area are provided to each team and their unmanned aircraft must not travel outside the search area or transit lane.<\/p>\n

When a team locates Outback Joe, they must provide the GPS co-ordinates to the judges. If their UAV is\u00a0within 100m of Joe\u2019s location, the team will then be given approval to deliver the emergency package. This consists of 500ml of water which\u00a0must be dropped as closely as possible to Joe (without landing on him). The UAV must\u00a0then return to the Kingaroy airport for recovery.<\/p>\n

No team has ever won the Search and Rescue Challenge, but in 2010 a team of students from the\u00a0University of North Dakota\u00a0located the elusive dummy but failed to drop the bottle of water to him, just missing out on the $50,000 first prize. However, they took home $15,000 as consolation.<\/p>\n

Nine teams who have been preparing for almost two years for the event will be taking part in this year’s Search and Rescue Challenge and competing for the $50,000 first prize:<\/strong><\/p>\n