Google Wins New Patent for Emergency Drone Call System

Miriam McNabb

9 years ago

Figure from Google’s Emergency Drone Patent Application

Google Emergency Drone — Figure from Google’s Emergency Drone Patent Application

Google has won a new patent for an emergency drone call system.

While Google has filed patents for delivery receptacles and delivery drones, this patent is for a humanitarian drone communications system that would send an appropriately equipped drone to the site of an emergency, enabling the delivery of critical equipment more quickly than a traditional ambulance stuck in traffic.

The patent indicates that Google would use portable boxes to allow people to request medical aid, listing the medical emergency and the needed supplies. The box would then send the data to the drone depot, where the drone could be dispatched either automatically or under pilot control to the location of the emergency. The system would also alert medical dispatchers to send professional help; and provide video assistance to the person requesting help on the appropriate use of the supplies sent. Google’s patent suggest that multiple types of drones could be deployed for different situations and localities.

If the figure above looks simple, it’s meant to. The patent document says that the system is designed for ease and speed: “The interface of the example apparatus may be configured to allow for fast and easy identification and selection of the particular medical emergency, or medical support implement necessary to address the particular medical emergency, such as with easy to read knobs, switches, or touch-sensitive controls…which may help to eliminate the twenty seconds it typically takes, on average, for a person dialing 911 to even be connected to an operator or dispatcher.”

The patent overview points out that in the case of certain medical emergencies, a short amount of time means the difference between life and death. As an example, the overview says, in a case of cardiac arrest 95% of victims die on the way to the hospital without defibrillation. A drone configured with a defibrillator could be dispatched to the scene of the emergency within 90-120 seconds from the time of request, the patent document states.

Google announced several months ago that they hoped drone delivery would be a reality by 2017 – maybe emergency equipment will be among the first category of items to be delivered.

Miriam McNabb

Miriam McNabb is the Editor-in-Chief of DRONELIFE and CEO of JobForDrones, a professional drone services marketplace, and a fascinated observer of the emerging drone industry and the regulatory environment for drones. Miriam has penned over 3,000 articles focused on the commercial drone space and is an international speaker and recognized figure in the industry. Miriam has a degree from the University of Chicago and over 20 years of experience in high tech sales and marketing for new technologies.
For drone industry consulting or writing, Email Miriam.

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