Sunrise, Sunset and Temperature Now-cast model comparisons for local Safe Drone Flights Predictions: Case study of Durban, South Africa

The need for climate predictions by the aviation, maritime and agriculture sector, has led to now-casting models being investigated. Now-casting is the climatic prediction of up to 6 hours into the future. The accuracy of the now-casting temperature predictions is dependent on the sunrise and sunset times. The now-casting sunrise and sunset times prediction model is compared with the NOAA model sunrise and sunset times. Using these two models, the temperature now-casting predictions for daytime and nighttime is determined to compared and identify the accuracy between them.

I. Introduction

The South African civil aviation authority (CAA) have been the first country to implement regulations for the flying of drones, unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), or remote piloted aerial systems (RPAS) [1]. One of the regulations are that these RPAS can only be flown during daytime, and flying can start 15 minutes before sunrise and 15 minutes after sunset [2] [3].