Coupling Wireless Sensor Networks and Unmanned Aerial Vehicles in Bridge Health Monitoring Systems

Bridges are exposed to different types of damages within their lifetime. Bridge maintenance is an essential procedure that can significantly affect lifetime and serviceability of bridges. First step in bridge maintenance is inspection. Visual inspection has been traditionally the dominant method of bridge inspection. Although visual inspection is still used by several authorities to inspect bridges, it is prone to errors, due to human biased judgment. Using wireless sensor networks is a non-destructive method that can help bridge maintenance teams to monitor bridge health. Although there are many advantages associated with using wireless sensor networks in bridges, there are some downsides such as battery failure and large volume of collected and transmitted data. Unmanned aerial vehicle is a mobile robotic agent that can help wireless sensor networks to overcome some of its shortcomings. This paper initially explores the advantages and disadvantages of using wireless sensor networks in bridge health monitoring systems. Then, the advantages of using unmanned aerial vehicles in bridge health monitoring systems are discussed. And finally, this paper investigates possible synergies of coupling unmanned aerial vehicles and wireless sensor networks in bridge health monitoring systems that might help bridge health monitoring systems to overcome some of its traditional limitations. The contribution of this paper is to identify and discuss the possible synergies between unmanned aerial vehicles and wireless sensor networks in bridge health monitoring systems.