JANUARY 23 • 2020 | 29

Jews in the D
Matthew and Connor 
Tukel’
s drone.

PHOTOGRAPHY COURTESY OF MATTHEW TUKEL

response data set from the 
Detroit city controller to help 
them gather the data points 
and distances they needed to 
test the drone for.
Next, they conducted 50 
flight trials with the drone 
across seven different straight-
line distances. The data col-
lected at the end of the trials 
proved that the drone travel 
times are faster than ambu-
lance arrival times.
“We wanted to have a ref-
erence as to what a paradigm 
was currently for Detroit 
first responders responding 
to the scene of 
opioid overdoses,
” 
Matthew said. 
“We took their 
data and com-
pared it to ours 
that we acquired, 
and we found that 
our drone was as 
fast, if not faster, 
than Detroit’
s 
first responders.
”
If cities do incorporate 
drones, they would need to 
develop drone deployment 
centers near high overdose 
areas. The brothers shared 
that these centers would allow 
for drones to be quickly sent 
out to reach the patient and 
empower bystanders to assist 
before the arrival of first 
responders.
Matthew recently presented 
his findings during a presen-
tation titled “Time-to-Scene 
for Opioid Overdoses — Are 
Unmanned Aerial Drones 
Faster than Traditional First 
Responders in an Urban 
Environment?” at the 
Michigan American College of 
Physicians’
 annual meeting in 

Grand Rapids.
He won first place in the 
medical student category and 
earned a spot to travel to Los 
Angeles in April to present 
at the National American 
College of Physicians’
 meeting.
The brothers have now sub-
mitted a more extensive man-
uscript of their findings to the 
British Medical Journal with 
hopes of it being published.
“The significance of the 
publication is that it will val-
idate the concept,
” Matthew 
said. “It will then open up the 
door and start a conversation 
saying that 
this might be a 
solution to this 
big problem.
”
While the 
findings show 
positive results, 
there is still 
more research 
that needs 
to be done 
before we see 
drones delivering the medica-
tions.
“We validated the intuition 
that a drone can travel fast-
er than an ambulance in an 
urban environment,
” Connor 
said. “The trials were very 
controlled, and we need to 
now look at real-world practi-
cal considerations.
”
The brothers credit much 
of their success to their family 
and Jewish upbringing.
“We learned the values of 
empowerment and feeling like 
you had a responsibility to do 
something to improve the lives 
of other people and had that 
ingrained in us throughout 
our lives,
” Connor said. 

Matthew Tukel piloting the drone.

How 

Friendship 

Circle is 

Changing 

Teens Lives

TWENTY-FIVE YEARS

Nicole Kahan was a seventh 
grader at Hillel Day School 
in Farmington Hills when 
she heard about a place 
where she could volunteer 
to befriend children with 
special needs. Her first 
experience volunteering 
with Friendship Circle was 
with the Friends at Home 
program offering families 
respite and friendship for 
their children with special 
needs. 
“I will never forget that 
first day being dropped off 
to meet my Buddy,” Kahan 
says. “I was nervous at first. 
But then, all I needed to 
do was spend time with her 
and be a friend. That visit 
changed everything for 
me.”
Kahan was so committed 
to the impact she was able 
to have on each Buddy’s 
life that she began vol-
unteering weekly. In high 
school, she was a regular, 
volunteering almost every 
day after school and on the 
weekends at Friendship 
Circle. She is also one of 
the first board members for 

Friendship Circle’s UMatter 
program. 
“I started coming any 
time I could,” Kahan says. 
“I was here after school for 
Social Circle on Tuesdays, 
Life Skills on Wednesdays 
and Sunday Circle, too. 
I worked with different 
Buddies all the time and 
learned so much about how 
to find a way to connect 
with even the most difficult 
kids to help them feel like 
they had a place to have 
fun here.” 
Now a sophomore at 
Wayne State University, 
Kahan is studying psychol-
ogy with an emphasis on 
Applied Behavior Analysis. 
Her decision to study psy-
chology is due in large part 
to her work at Friendship 
Circle. Kahan drives back 
every Sunday to work as a 
leader at Sunday Circle. 
“Honestly, without 
Friendship Circle, I’d be so 
sad. When people ask me 
where I see myself in 10 
years, I tell them, I hope it’s 
working at Friendship Cir-
cle,” Kahan says. “Everyone 

Get involved, 
go to 
friendshipcircle.org/
foreverfriendship

Nicole 
Kahan: