This can be tricky work for humans, so the company has turned to the Flyability Elios 2 to get the job done.
The sewer inspections are crucial for the maintenance of the wastewater systems because they help:
Sewer inspections are more important than ever in France right now because of a new national law that requires all major cities in the country to have their wastewater infrastructure inspected and diagnosed by 2026. The law has put tremendous pressure on cities, making them turn to experts in the field like Suez RV Osis for help.
Traditionally, inspectors at RV Osis have used a variety of methods to collect visual data inside sewers. These include using dollies or carts to roll a camera through a pipe, floating a CCTV camera inside the pipe, or having an inspector go through the pipe in person with a camera. But these approaches are limited and are only useful up to a certain point.
This is especially true for manual data collection, since many of the pipes that Suez personnel inspect present a significant danger for entry due to:
Because of these limitations, only about 80% of the wastewater systems that Suez oversees can be inspected using traditional methods.
To get 80% up to 100% the team turned to Flyability’s Elios 2, which can provide inspectors with remote access to areas that present dangers to inspectors for direct entry.
Using traditional methods, Suez inspectors can inspect about 400-600 meters (1,312-1,968 feet) of wastewater infrastructure a day. But with the Elios 2, it can inspect up to 900 meters (2,952 feet) a day, increasing its inspection speed by anywhere from 50% to more than double what it can achieve using traditional methods.
Using sparse points clouds generated by the software, inspectors can pinpoint the specific place in a pipe that requires maintenance and share that information with other stakeholders in the maintenance process. The precision of the locational data provided by Inspector 3.0 allows RV Osis’ clients to dig right to the place that requires maintenance, without having to waste time digging to the wrong place.
At RV Osis, the term “inspection flight” encompasses a series of steps taken by the inspection team:
Credit: Flyability