N09-T001 TITLE: Autonomous Launch, Recovery and Turn-Around Systems for Small UAVs

TECHNOLOGY AREAS: Air Platform, Ground/Sea Vehicles

OBJECTIVE: To develop a system whereby small UAVs can be retrieved, serviced, and launched without attending personnel.

DESCRIPTION: While UAVs typically operate autonomously while in flight, and even during launch and retrieval, they continue to require manual handling during turnaround. Elimination of post-deployment manual handling would permit more flexible basing, including the potential for operation from unattended sites. Such a concept would allow forward basing of the UAV, while reducing risk to personnel. Concepts suitable for practical fully-automated launch, recovery and turnaround must be developed and demonstrated for small-scale UAVs. Of particular interest is the development of technologies that contribute to autonomous launch/recovery/turnaround of small UAVs in confined areas, remote sites and on-board at-sea vessels and platforms.

Proposed system should support UAVs with the following characteristics:
1. Gross weight class of up to 100 lbs.
2. Flight endurance greater than 24 hours.

Proposed solutions should consist of a ground support system that would capture, secure, stow, shelter, refuel and/or recharge, release and launch the UAV. The ground support system concept should be compact enough to be delivered and deployed with a high mobility military vehicle (HMMV), small truck or air transported with a helicopter. Future applications/enhancements of this system may be deployment of UAVs by unmanned ground vehicles.

PHASE I: Demonstrate technical feasibility for fully-automated retrieval, service, and launch of small UAVs in practical operating conditions, including hardware demonstration at the component level.

PHASE II: Develop and test prototype systems, including flight demonstration of fully automated turnaround. The concept can be demonstrated with any type or size of vehicle, so long as the concept can be shown scale-able to a UAV with the performance characteristics of the aforementioned class air-vehicles.

PHASE III: Fully develop and demonstrate a functional prototype launch/recovery/servicing apparatus.

PRIVATE SECTOR COMMERCIAL POTENTIAL/DUAL-USE APPLICATIONS: Fully-automated turnaround would improve the economics and viability of emerging civil applications for small UAVs, such as forest-fire and disaster monitoring, environmental reconnaissance, border patrol, and search and rescue.

REFERENCES:
1. Olivier Doucy, Nicolas Cellier and Philippe Corrignan. Recent developments in shipborne automatic homing and recovery of unmanned vehicles . UAV Systems International Conference & Exhibition, Paris, June 2007.

2. Mullens, Burmeister, Wills, Stroumtsos, Denewiler, Thomas, Stancliff. Automated Launch, Recovery, and Refueling for Small Unmanned Aerial Vehicles. SPAWAR, SAIC, Carnegie Mellon University, 2006.

KEYWORDS: UAV; UAS; Servicing; Autonomous; Unmanned; Automated