Drone Relay Chain: Mountain Signal Coverage

A mountain-rescue search drone is only useful if its video and telemetry actually reach the base station, and mountainous terrain routinely breaks direct radio links through a mix of inverse-square signal decay and outright line-of-sight blockage from ridgelines. This simulation places a chain of relay drones between a fixed base station and a roaming search drone exploring a procedurally generated mountain range, computing real per-hop signal strength from a Friis-style inverse-square model and checking every hop against the terrain for line-of-sight obstruction. Compare a terrain-following relay placement strategy, which hugs a fixed clearance above the ground beneath each relay, against a naive straight-line interpolation that dips into valleys and gets blocked by peaks far more often — and watch the live signal, chain status and path-length readouts respond as you add relays, raise transmit power or make the mountains more rugged.