In this article, AS Tampere’s Treasurer Lauri Wahlström and Secretary Ekku Kemppi share their summer job experience with unmanned airships.
First, we’ll introduce you to the company – Kelluu. Kelluu is a Finnish company founded in 2018 that builds and operates unmanned, hydrogen-powered airships for aerial monitoring and mapping. Kelluu airships have the capability to capture data from vast areas more affordably and more quickly than alternatives like drones. The airships don’t need to use energy to stay in the air, which allows for significantly longer flight times than with alternatives. Using hydrogen as fuel also means that they are essentially emission-free. Being lighter than air makes the airships safer to operate over populated areas like large cities. They also produce significantly less noise than conventional drones, resulting in minimal disturbance to people, animals, and the surrounding environment.
Our role at Kelluu has been primarily as airship pilots, but we have also taken on tasks as technicians. While most of the flight is autonomous, we handle all takeoffs and landings manually. During flights, we continuously monitor the airship’s systems and stay alert to ensure everything runs smoothly.
The work is especially interesting since every flying gig is different. We get to see new places and fly different kinds of missions with different payloads and sensors. One of the most memorable missions from this summer has been creating a 3D model of the city of Tampere. It was a longer project, so it was especially rewarding to finally see glimpses of the finished product, a detailed digital twin of the city. (https://youtu.be/4tTE8Eu9VwY)
The best part of working at Kelluu has been the chance to work with modern technology and contribute to the future of aerial environmental monitoring. We’ve also had the opportunity to apply what we’ve learned in our studies to help further develop the airship, and we have gained a lot of new knowledge by getting hands-on with the systems in real-world conditions. It’s been great to learn something new almost every day, especially since the technology is still evolving rapidly. It has been great fun to fly something completely different from more conventional flying vehicles.
A former AS Tampere chairman is currently also working with Kelluu and the company has collaborated with AS Tampere before by attending our career day last year. Hopefully we’ll be able to plan something together again in the future!