URI engineering students win FAA competition

FROM LEFT: R.I. Airport Corporation Vice President Alan Andrade; AvPorts Line Service Technician Lynn Dadona; URI students David Powers, Ronald Wheeler, Lawrence Higgins, Kyle DellaGrotta and Christopher Clark; and AvPorts Operations Manager David Lucas at Quonset State Airport.
FROM LEFT: R.I. Airport Corporation Vice President Alan Andrade; AvPorts Line Service Technician Lynn Dadona; URI students David Powers, Ronald Wheeler, Lawrence Higgins, Kyle DellaGrotta and Christopher Clark; and AvPorts Operations Manager David Lucas at Quonset State Airport.

SOUTH KINGSTOWN – Five University of Rhode Island students won first place in last month’s national federal Aviation Administration competition seeking prototype designs intended to improve airport operations.
Christopher Clark of Narragansett, Kyle DellaGrotta of Cranston, Lawrence Higgins of Portsmouth, David Powers of Cumberland, and Ronald Wheeler of Aurora, Ohio, invented their device during their senior design capstone course, which requires students to solve a real-world problem with a viable product.
The 5-pound “Wingman” device, which costs about $800, temporarily attaches to an aircraft wingtip with suction cups and monitors the airport tarmac area using ultrasonic sensors as the aircraft is towed to the runway. When the plane approaches a nearby object, such as the wingtip of another aircraft, the system emits lights and sounds to warn of a potential collision.
Wheeler, who served in the R.I. Air National Guard as a C-130 loadmaster, brought his firsthand experience with the dangers of wingtip collisions into the project.
“It was more than a senior design project,” Wheeler said. “I had personal feelings about it. I was excited, and I tried to rub that motivation off on the team.”
The URI team conferred with officials at the R.I. Airport Corporation on the project and tested the Wingman prototype at Quonset State Airport. The panel of FAA officials and industry experts who judged the competition awarded the project first place in the airport management and planning category.
This year was the first time URI garnered the top spot in the FAA design competition. Previously, URI teams had placed second and third.
Clark, DellaGrotta, Higgins, Powers and Wheeler will travel to Washington, D.C., later this month to present their invention to FAA officials, URI said.

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