Ensuring Mission Success with Our Resilient Autopilot
Contemporary unmanned aircraft are increasingly encountering challenging scenarios where mission success may be compromised for various reasons. Beyond external threats like jamming or spoofing, which aim to disable or disrupt the navigation system, other potential setbacks can also affect mission completion.
Every Unmanned Aircraft System (UAS) mission is a complex operation involving multiple interdependent elements that must work with high precision and synchronization. This complexity extends to unmanned aviation, where the flight control system, particularly the autopilot, plays a critical role as the central component of the avionics, akin to the brain in a central nervous system, coordinating all subsystems within the UAS. Thus, relying on a resilient and reliable system capable of handling challenging situations during flight is crucial for a professional unmanned aircraft system.
This resilience is also the cornerstone for regulatory entities such as the European Aviation Safety Agency (EASA), which focuses on the operational risk to assess whether the operation can be carried out safely. The higher the risk associated with an operation, the more mitigation measures will be required, considering the performance of the systems and the human factors involved. This may be especially relevant for specific category operations, where the Specific Assurance and Integrity Level (SAIL) deduced from the Specific Operations Risk Assessment (SORA) is directly linked to the level of robustness of the system and where only professional systems will be able to meet the highest levels required by the regulation.
UAV Navigation-Grupo Oesía, a professional aerospace company with extensive industry experience, understands the critical importance of its flight control systems for mission success. The company develops and manufactures its products with meticulous attention to detail and precision. Additionally, significant resources have been invested in developing robust algorithms designed to handle sensor and subsystem failures and to manage difficult situations during flight, thereby ensuring mission success. It is worth highlighting:
Accurate Navigation in Challenging Missions and Contested Environments
As technology advances and geopolitical challenges emerge, the need for reliable and secure navigation for UAS becomes increasingly critical. Ensuring operational integrity in both civil and defense sectors, especially in challenging scenarios, is of utmost importance.
UAV Navigation-Grupo Oesía's guidance, navigation and control systems have a field-proven strong resilience against contested environments. The MIL-STD-461F and MIL-STD 810F qualified components allow precise navigation in challenging maritime environments. Our advanced internal logic enables dead-reckoning navigation even without a reliable Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) connectivity. The flight control system incorporates sophisticated internal algorithms capable of identifying jamming and spoofing attempts. Upon detection, the system automatically prioritizes alternative navigation sources, considering the information from the rest of the available sensors to ensure flight safety, thereby reducing dependence on GNSS signals.
The fusion of inertial navigation provided by our POLAR Attitude and Heading Reference System (AHRS) family (the POLAR-300 and POLAR-500), also within our VECTOR family of autopilots (VECTOR-400 and VECTOR-600), and the visual navigation provided by our Visual Navigation System (VNS01), enables accurate dead reckoning with minimal drift. This constitutes the cornerstone of our GNSS-Denied Navigation Kit's capabilities.
One of the most relevant technologies and challenging missions that has been making waves in recent years is UAV swarming capabilities. Swarming operations enable a group of autonomous drones to operate in a coordinated and synchronized manner. Each UAV communicates with its wingmen in the swarm, sharing information and working together to accomplish tasks more efficiently and effectively than a single UAS could on its own. The concept of multiple unmanned aircraft working together in the air but also in multiple domains and collaborative missions, with ground and maritime platforms and even manned aircraft called Manned-Unmanned Teaming (MUM-T) or Collaborative Combat Aircraft (CCA) as a cohesive unit is revolutionizing industries.
Swarming missions create a high level of workload for operators, which can lead them to mistakenly command the aircraft to fly over restricted areas. UAV Navigation-Grupo Oesía is fully aware of this, so the system has been designed to include geofencing and sense and avoidance capabilities, which help the autopilot to detect when the aircraft approaches no-fly zones and autonomously replans the mission to avoid entering these areas and accomplish the mission safely.
Assured Autonomy in Complex Flight Operations
Datalinks, or data links, facilitate the exchange of information between the Ground Control Station (GCS) and the autopilot (Flight Control Computer - FCC). This is a critical point in UAS operations, as commands are transmitted upstream from the GCS to the FCC, and telemetry data is transmitted downstream from the FCC to the GCS. Many autopilots on the market, which rely on joysticks, manual control or even constant command of the platform for mission completion, depend heavily on communication for their success. Therefore, any attempt to attack and disable the communication stream can significantly endanger UAS operations, making these systems highly vulnerable. In Beyond Visual Line of Sight (BVLOS) missions, these flight controllers often require sophisticated and costly datalinks, such as those using the HF (High Frequency) band or Satellite Communications (SATCOMs), which have extremely expensive data stream connections.
UAV Navigation-Grupo Oesía autopilots are not dependent on the data link's performance. Our advanced autopilot software enables missions to be completed even if the datalink becomes unavailable or fails. The entire mission is stored in the autopilot's internal memory, making it completely autonomous and independent of the data link status.
The UAV Navigation-Grupo Oesía systems are specifically designed to offer fully autonomous capabilities for unmanned aircraft. The company's advanced flight control solution integrates numerous automatic features. These capabilities include managing multiple landing sites throughout a mission, ensuring that in emergencies, the aircraft autonomously directs to the nearest available airfield. Additionally, the system executes pre-configured automatic actions at waypoints based on the flight plan, enabling tasks such as loitering, surveillance, or specific area operations without operator intervention. This autonomous operation capability enables the system to seamlessly continue missions without human input, facilitating tasks like cargo delivery and aerial photography with enhanced efficiency and precision.
However, UAV Navigation-Grupo Oesía’s top priority remains ensuring flight safety while advancing autonomous features. To achieve this, the VECTOR autopilot integrates internal logic designed to respond to a BINGO Time alarm or other critical safety conditions during flight by directing the aircraft to a customizable safe altitude and guiding it home securely. Furthermore, when connected to a Mission Control Computer (MCC), the Flight Control Computer (FCC) can segregate critical flight safety functions from non-critical tasks, thereby reducing an operator’s workload. The MCC also enables autonomous activation of non-critical safety measures, such as deploying a parachute or other countermeasures through the onboard Flight Termination System (FTS). This integration with the MCC could be helpful for meeting stringent certification standards.
A Robust and Redundant System to Overcome Failures
Flight incidents and accidents often result from a chain of interconnected failures. UAV Navigation-Grupo Oesía has meticulously designed its entire system architecture and internal logic to ensure mission continuity and safe conclusion, particularly in the event of sensor failures.
Simply equipping an aircraft with redundant hardware systems does not guarantee the autopilot's ability to continue the mission in the event of partial or complete system failure, nor does it qualify as a truly redundant autopilot for drones. True redundancy extends beyond component duplication; it necessitates a system with a low probability of failure or a high Mean Time Between Failures (MTBF). The VECTOR-600 autopilot has undergone rigorous third-party evaluation, achieving an impressively low probability of mission loss at 1.809E-05 per flight hour. This evaluation included a comprehensive Reliability Prediction Report (RPR), Failure Mode Effects and Criticality Analysis (FMECA), and Fault Tree Analysis (FTA). Years of flight data analysis have further refined our system reliability, complemented by internal algorithms that continuously monitor system integrity through a watchdog managed by the Field-Programmable Gate Array (FPGA).
The VECTOR family of autopilots features a deterministic system with hardware and functional redundancy in critical components like flight control Central Processing Units (CPUs) and sensors. This design maximizes reliability and flight safety without unnecessary additional hardware. Even in the event of power micro-outages, the system will detect it and change to the redundant CPU to prevent incidents. This algorithm of control is called “Failsafe”. Failsafe preserves the state of the autopilot when a reset occurs. Failsafe protects the mission against manual reset by the operator or external power supplies cycle reset. Even in the case of other external component failures, such as servos, which cause a control surface to freeze, resulting in uncontrolled forces on the aircraft that affect flight dynamics, the system can control the aircraft by compensating for these forces and moments and guaranteeing flight safety by commanding the remaining control surfaces.
UAV Navigation-Grupo Oesía’s autopilots include a proprietary AHRS system that relies on inertial sensors and advanced sensor fusion algorithms to ensure mission completion. The company has invested years of development in refining the POLAR AHRS, a core system within its products, which provides uninterrupted navigation functionality even in the event of sensor failures. The system can detect the source of failure and autonomously calculate navigational data with the rest of the available sensors. This makes the entire flight control system deterministic, as every detail has been tested, and the system's behavior is thoroughly understood.
Improved Operator Situational-Awareness
At UAV Navigation-Grupo Oesía, one of our primary concerns is reducing the workload of UAS operators, as high workloads can lead to critical errors that endanger missions. Our system is designed to help Designated Unmanned Operators (DUOs) reduce stress and enhance situational awareness.
UAV Navigation-Grupo Oesía’s mission planner, when the VECTOR autopilot is equipped with an ADS-B IN transponder, can receive and display real-time data about surrounding UAS traffic. This feature enhances the operator's situational awareness by providing crucial air traffic information and showing proximity warnings and alarms in bright, customizable colors that attract the pilot's attention and help prevent flight incidents.
The mission planner software includes various visual aids to help operators focus on essential tasks, leaving flight control to the autopilot. The GCS software features easy-to-interpret mission displays, alarms, and notifications and a realistic 3D model visualization, which are crucial for the safe and efficient operation of Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs). The clear visualization of active alarms, real-time reporting, and comprehensive logging system empowers operators to take prompt and informed actions, ensuring successful UAV missions.
Additionally, it includes predictive path visualization, a tool that helps operators foresee the aircraft's trajectory. This feature allows operators to plan preventative actions such as evasive maneuvers or emergency procedures. For example, in the event of a total loss of thrust, meaning complete engine failure without a redundant propulsion system, the software will display the estimated point of contact with the terrain, enabling the remote pilot to guide the aircraft to a safe touchdown. The VECTOR family of autopilots is equipped to execute emergency maneuvers, such as automatic gliding descent, optimizing kinetic and potential energy balance to extend the aircraft’s range or the automatic autorotation algorithm for controlled descent of rotary-wing platforms. In cases of partial thrust loss, such as the failure of one engine in a redundant engine setup, the system can compensate for aerodynamic forces and moments using the control surfaces, ensuring flight safety and mission completion.
Complex UAS missions can also significantly increase operator workload, leading to incorrect maneuvers or following an incorrect flight plan. The system includes advanced flight envelope protection to prevent this, which ensures the aircraft always flies at the correct airspeed and load factors. This algorithm provides additional protection for the UAS platform and the operation.
As outlined in this document, UAV Navigation-Grupo Oesía comprehensive technological solution operates within the domain of Artificial Intelligence, particularly through the implementation of an expert system which includes cutting-edge algorithms to ensure operational success. We are focused on developing robust and autonomous systems capable of functioning in contested environments. These systems fulfill complex mission requirements and coordinate among multiple units, always prioritizing flight safety and ensuring mission completion.
UAV Navigation-Grupo Oesía's design philosophy emphasizes operational reliability through high-quality components, sensor fusion logic, enhanced situational awareness and advanced flight control algorithms.
Contact us to integrate advanced flight control solutions into your unmanned platform and start prioritizing flight safety and ensuring fully autonomous mission accomplishment.
