A Coupled Ship Motion/Airwake Model for Naval Aircraft Simulation Applications

"Proper simulation-based assessment of aircraft launch and recovery operations from Navy vessels is critically dependent upon the availability of accurate models of the airwake environment surrounding the ship. Current airwake models in use, however, arelimited to simulating only steady ship headings relative to a uniform flow field, and do not include any dynamic ship motion responses to surface waves. Continuum Dynamics, Inc. (CDI) proposes the development of a new ship airwake/ship motion/aircraftmotion software interface that will provide a range of code modules with scalable fidelity that can properly simulate the airwake environment around ships for aircraft flight simulation. The resulting software can support ship designers, dynamic interface(DI) test planners, aircrew training and flight planning, UAV operator interface design, and sailor training exercises. The Phase I/Phase II program will leverage: (1) previous corporate experience in unsteady flow analysis and software development; (2)an in-house first-principles, time-accurate free wake analysis for rotorcraft flight dynamics; (3) a fast panel-based code for computing wakes and airloads from aircraft and lifting surfaces in arbitrary relative motion; and (4) recent research intosupporting real-time simulation of the DI test environment. Accurate prediction of airwake effects on Naval aircraft would support enhanced safety of air operations from a range of surface ves