Aerospace 2015, 2, 222-234; doi:10.3390/aerospace2020222
aerospace
ISSN 2226-4310
www.mdpi.com/journal/aerospace
Article
Trajectory Management of the Unmanned Aircraft System
(UAS) in Emergency Situation
Andrzej Majka
Department of Aircraft and Aircraft Engines, Faculty of Mechanical Engineering and Aeronautics,
Rzeszow University of Technology, 12, Powstancow Warszawy Str., 35-959 Rzeszow, Poland;
E-Mail: andrzej.majka@prz.edu.pl; Tel.: +48-17-865-1604; Fax: +48-17-854-3116
Academic Editor: David Anderson
Received: 1 February 2015 / Accepted: 18 March 2015 / Published: 4 May 2015
Abstract: Unmanned aircraft must be characterized by a level of safety, similar to that of
manned aircraft, when performing flights over densely populated areas. Dangerous
situations or emergencies are frequently connected with the necessity to change the profiles
and parameters of a flight as well as the flight plans. The aim of this work is to present the
methods used to determine an Unmanned Aircraft System’s (UAS) flight profile after a
dangerous situation or emergency occurs. The analysis was limited to the possibility of an
engine system emergency and further flight continuing along a trajectory of which the
shape depends on the type of the emergency. The suggested method also enables the
determination of an optimal flying trajectory, based on the territory of a special protection
zone (for example, large populated areas), in the case of an emergency that would disable
continuation of the performed task. The method used in this work allows researchers,
in a simplified way, to solve a variation task using the Ritz–Galerkin method, consisting of
an approximate solution of the boundary value problem to determine the optimal flight
path. The worked out method can become an element of the on-board system supporting
UAS flight control.
Keywords: autonomous systems; unmanned systems operational analysis; flight path planning
OPEN ACCESS
