In the new academic year, the Institute of Mechanical Engineering and Transport, Lviv Polytechnic, will open a new educational program - «Unmanned Aerial Vehicles», the specialty No. 134 «Aviation, Rocket and Space Engineering» at the Department of Oil and Gas Engineering and Welding.
Until 1939, Polytechnic actively developed the field of aircraft construction. Our University became the second in the world to open the Department of Aerodynamics at the beginning of the last century (the first was Sorbonne University). However, with the arrival of the Soviet leadership, aircraft construction was abandoned in Lviv.
Olesia Maksymovych, Head of the Department of Oil and Gas Engineering and Welding, Lviv Polytechnic National University, says that the process of realizing the ambitious idea of restoring aircraft construction at Polytechnic has been a long one.
- Rector of Lviv Polytechnic Yurii Bobalo has long dreamed of restoring the aviation direction, which at one time was actively developing at our University. However, there was a lack of staff, as well as there was no one who would be ready to organize it. I volunteered to lead the process and began by studying the substance of the issue. I was communicating with various people involved in this field, and establishing cooperation. Serhii Nedilko, the former rector of the Kropyvnytsky Aviation Academy, who headed this institution for eleven years, suggested me to think about drones. After all, today it is the profession of the future, a new direction that will develop very rapidly in the coming years. Nedilko said that whoever is the first to implement it in their institution will become a leader in the market of educational services. I loved this phrase. In addition, the classic training of pilots is very expensive for the university. Polytechnic welcomed the idea of introducing this new area of training related to unmanned aerial vehicles. And we started a rather long process until the Ministry of Education and Science gave the final permit on April 27, - says the Head of the Department of Oil and Gas Engineering and Welding.
