Maneuver Prediction and Avoidance Logic For Unmanned Aircraft System (UAS) Encounters with Non-Cooperative Air Traffic

RDRTec Inc. and Lincoln Laboratory propose to establish the feasibility and develop the plan for an extensible analytic framework and methodology to address unanticipated maneuver encounter modeling, collision risk estimation, and ownship maneuver logic. With the widespread introduction of Unmanned Aircraft Systems (UAS), the nature of the airspace will change significantly over the next 10-20 years as they are fully integrated into both segregated and non-segregated airspace. New procedures and technologies will be required to ensure safe airspace operations via conflict avoidance while accommodating increasing traffic demands. Conflict avoidance has two main functions; Collision Avoidance (CA) and self-separation. Self-Separation (SS) can be thought of as strategic planning between aircraft by either the Air Traffic Control (ATC) or a future Sense And Avoid (SAA) system to maintain a"well clear"separation so that collision avoidance maneuvers are not required. Collision avoidance is a time critical action that must be taken by each pilot or the SAA system to avoid a collision if the aircraft have failed to maintain a well clear separation.