ABSTRACT
Drones and artificial intelligence are fast-growing technologies that offer considerable potential for the inspection of large, high-rise structures, such as viaducts. Drones can lead to safer and more economical inspections. Several years ago, Belgium’s Service Public de Wallonie (SPW) began carrying out full drone inspections of its major structures. This survey includes photos, 3D model, orthomosaics of defects and database of defects.
The advantages of drone inspection are numerous. It allows precise visualization of hard-to-reach areas, as well as global analysis directly from orthomosaics. It also enables full digital documentation of the defects via the database.
However, the number of defects identified on large-scale structures can be extremely large. Manual detection of all these defects is time-consuming. So the SPW is now working with an artificial intelligence solution that can automatically identify defects in the structure on photos and positioning defect contours on 3D CAD models of the bridge.
