The Yeti Snow Technology company, owned jointly by the Norwegian companies Semcon Devotek and Øveraasen, announced the pilot deployment of the expected working full-scale self-driving snow removal vehicle at the Fagernes airport in Norway. This is the first project of this type in the world designed to keep runways clear of snow.

“Every minute a plane stands still is precious. We see great potential for gains in accessibility, but also for the environment and safety because the machine is self-driven,” says Hans Peter Havdal, general manager for Semcon Devotek.

Snow-removal vehicle. Source: Yeti Snow Technology

The 20-meter long and 5.5-meter wide vehicles are able to clear 350,000 square meters of snow per hour. These unmanned machines do not have many sensors and cameras like their counterparts moving on streets and roads because the exact routes to clean inside the airport are fixed and can be programmed. Using GPS and 4G technology the airport operator can program and monitor several of these machines moving on different routes.

If this pilot demonstration is successful, there are over 50 airports waiting for the machine in Norway. A video of the working machine is included in this article.