Power Line Patrol
Keep the lights on. Keep your distance. · Operation GRIDLOCK · 3 days suggested (1–7)
A neighborhood flickered last night. The utility needs to know why — without shutting the power off. Utilities inspect towers, insulators and substations with drones so line workers don't have to climb energized equipment. The rule is distance: inspect from a safe standoff, never close in.
- ◆ I can hold a precise standoff distance from an object.
- ◆ I can follow a hazard boundary without entering it.
- ◆ I can explain why utilities use drones to inspect energized equipment.
- Pilot: Flies the standoff line and holds each inspection point.
- Mission Commander: Holds the inspection list and the standoff rules.
- Engineer / Safety Observer: Watches the fence line and the battery; calls STOP.
Simulator challenges
Hold a 1 m hover outside the fence line for 3 seconds and land at the truck.
Fly it →Fly the standoff line around the substation, hold at each inspection point, and never cross into the fenced equipment area.
Fly it →Follow the power line corridor through the gates in order — under the line, never over it — and land at the truck.
Fly it →Program the drone to approach the tower until the front range sensor reads 60 cm, hold there to inspect, then back away and land.
Fly it →Fly along a taped standoff line around a 'tower' without crossing the fence tape.
- ☐ Never crossed the fence tape
- ☐ Held at all three points
- ☐ Inspection log complete
- ☐ Clear call-outs
Program keep_distance() or avoid_wall() to hold 60 cm from the tower and compare the result to a tape measure.
- ☐ Measured actual standoff
- ☐ Compared avoid_wall() with keep_distance()
- ☐ Explained sensor limits (range up to 150 cm)
- ☐ Safe coded flight
Zoom and thermal camera (simulated): Holding at an inspection point captures a zoom/thermal frame of the hardware. Real CoDrone EDU: CoDrone EDU has no camera. Its front range sensor (up to 150 cm) can measure standoff distance — crews use keep_distance() to practice holding one.
You found the cracked insulator and the hot connector from a safe standoff. A line crew can fix them on a planned outage instead of an emergency one.