After the first pre-campaign in 2022, a second pre-campaign was performed at Nafingalm in 2024 in order to prepare for the summer Extensive Observational Period (sEOP) of the TEAMx research programme. It was envisioned to measure in summer conditions but the weather was cooler than expected for mid-September, so part of the measurements happened to be taken above snow.
As opposed to 2022, we now had permission to fly a fleet of drones (up to ten drones per pilot) up to 230m AGL instead of single UAS up to 120m AGL only. Hence, the focus was on patterns with eight to ten drones hovering at fixed locations, instead of cross flights (horizontal profiles) with only two to three UAS as was done in 2022. Flight patterns this time were cubes / cuboids and horizontal lines along the valley axis with either linear or logarithmic distances of one drone to another. The UAS hovered between 50 and 200 m AGL for at least 10 minutes.
The TU BS research aircraft, operated by Karlsruhe Institute of Technology, performed TEAMx test flights on September 19, also crossing Nafingalm multiple times. The drone crew managed to have the UAS hovering just at the right time!
In the course of the two weeks (more accurately, September 18-26), most of the snow melted but the ground was still muddy. Hence, the take-off and landing site was the area at the very south of the valley floor where the ground was a bit more solid.
