The technology placed into giving football fans sky-cam views of their favorite NFL teams could one day offer another method by which cargo could be transported across the globe.
Currently, ships make about 500 million trips back-and-forth across the seas moving all forms of trade between nations, landing in major port cities that have the fortune of being able to accommodate the hundreds of ships coming and going each day. But if a vision by U.S. entrepreneur Jeremy Wiley comes to fruition, even the smallest of coastal cities will be able to compete with major ports without even building a harbor.
Wiley's idea is to build a network of "robot cranes" extending into the sky, supported by giant balloons. These cranes would look like giant, hollow pyramids with four tethers leading from the central balloon and planting in some port city. Within the pyramid would be four more tethers acting as the dynamic means of transporting cargo from an offshore ship to a coastal town or city, without the need of a port.
By adjusting the lengths of the four tethers within the pyramid, cargo could be picked up and transported to anywhere within the crane pyramid.
The concept creates a new mechanism for transporting goods, allowing alternative methods of transport in the case of shipping gridlock, or giving the U.S. Navy and Marines a quicker way to transport supplies.
But perhaps, most importantly, Wiley's device, dubbed "Tethered Air", would revolutionize the economics of shipping. This invention would prove a great opportunity for smaller cities to become more viable trading ports and compete with larger, better-established ports.
The idea was formed when Wiley was a U.S. Marine unloading ships in Kuwait during the Iraq War effort. He later discovered that Canadian loggers had thought of using balloons and cables to move felled trees, but the effort eventually fell apart due to a lack of technology.
However, with the advances in modern robotics, Wiley believes his idea can work. Like the cameras at NFL games, the cable robotics would allow for quick and efficient changes in tether length, except at a massive scale.
Wiley estimates that a demonstration of his idea would cost around $30,000, and a complete setup would be around $7 million to $10 million. While it may sound expensive, compared with the $20 million the U.S. Navy and Marine Corp recently spent on building a pier to reach Haiti after the 2010 earthquake, Tethered Air looks like a much cheaper means for humanitarian aid.
