Detect-and-Avoid Project Hits New Milestones

Vigilant Aerospace began a project for the Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL) last year, aiming to develop a detect-and-avoid (DAA) system for the Air Force’s new long-endurance drone. 

The company has continued to reach important milestones on the path to bringing FlightHorizon PILOT, a dual-use (for both civilian and military users) onboard detect-and-avoid product, to the military.

This project is being completed under an SBIR Phase II contract, which is a program designed to fill important capability gaps quickly and to utilize technologies that have a high-impact, near-term implementation path for the military as well as having a potential civilian market.

This project represents a major investment by the US Air Force in the future of uncrewed aircraft system (UAS) operations and airspace safety and recognition of the major role autonomous systems will play in the future of both defense and civilian aviation.

Progress to Date

The company has made significant progress in the development and testing of the FlightHorizon PILOT product:

• The FlightHorizon PILOT system has been effectively tested with multiple radars operating simultaneously, allowing it to obtain a wide field of regard for air traffic detection that helps the product to meet industry technical standards for both onboard detect-and-avoid and to support distributed sensor nodes when used on the ground.
• Radar frequency channelization has been utilized and tested to demonstrate that multiple radars can be used without interference with each other.
• The system has been integrated to multiple ground control stations (GCS), including the popular Ardupilot open-source software and other widely used government and civilian GCS systems.
• Vigilant has deployed the software to multiple low space, weight and power (low-SWaP) computers for onboard use, including multiple single-board computers, in an effort to ensure it can be installed on a wide variety of both military and civilian aircraft. This may include both larger military and AAM aircraft and smaller UAS, where space and power are at a premium.
• The system is under development to be operated in either a “pilot-in-the-loop” model, where avoidance commands are sent to a remote pilot to be followed, or in a “pilot-on-the-loop” model, where a remote pilot receives alerts about avoidance maneuvers that will be taken automatically by the system and can intervene if needed.

The Mission

According to the public project profile, the objective is to “integrate a mature detect and avoid capability on an existing long-endurance, Group V UAS platform for increased aircraft and pilot-in-the-loop operational awareness that leverages new and evolving C-SWaP sensors and sensor fusion software.”

The project solicitation lists goals including demonstrating the utility of the system to several Air Force missions at different stages of conceptual maturity, supporting future missions and a strong recognition that autonomous flight is here to stay.

To accomplish this goal, Vigilant is utilizing its FlightHorizon PILOT product, which is an onboard detect-and-avoid system for drones that is designed to consume sensor data, detect nearby aircraft and provide collision avoidance commands to remote pilots or to the onboard autopilot.

The system provides commands that are compliant with the ACAS X collision avoidance standards from the FAA and can also provide air traffic alerts and situational awareness to remote pilots. It’s an extensible, scalable solution which fills an important gap for a viable, onboard, feature-complete, automatic DAA system.

Concept behind the FlightHorizon PILOT system, which is based on two licensed NASA patents.

Importantly, the product is platform agnostic so it can be installed on a wide variety of both military and civilian aircraft and can utilize a wide variety of radars and other sensors. It is also designed to be compliant with the RTCA DO-365C and DO-366 technical standards, to allow for use on any large UAS in the US.

The ability to correlate tracks from multiple sensors in a smart, compact unit that integrates with multiple autopilots and ground control stations provides the military with flexibility and modularity in the deployment of the system on a variety of potential UAS platforms.

Kraettli L. Epperson, CEO of Vigilant Aerospace, said, “Because the FlightHorizon system was designed by NASA for its aircraft tracking and UAS safety needs and has now been adapted to the commercial market by Vigilant Aerospace, this AFRL opportunity allows us to leverage our existing products and experience, and our major investment in multi-sensor integration and algorithms, to readily fulfill the AFRL project goals and rapidly bring new capabilities to the US Air Force.”

The company provides detail into the modern military need for onboard DAA systems, and delves into the potential implications of the project. 

More information can be found on the Vigilant Aerospace website.