Ship Dynamics/Ship Air Wake Interface

The launch and recovery of manned and autonomous aircraft are strongly affected by the ship motion resulting from the ocean wind and wave environment, the ship induced airwake, and aircraft interaction with the ship dynamics and the ship airwake. We propose to develop an advanced aircraft/ship dynamics/ship unsteady airwake interaction modeling and simulation tool for the purpose of design, testing, operational analysis, training, and planning. Efforts will be made in investigating the ship/ship airwake/aircraft dynamics model integration fidelity issues and developing a comprehensive simulation reference guideline to address the modeling requirements. The development will be made for the ship airwake model, with emphasis on the effect of unsteady ship motion. The development will also focus on modeling for rotor/ship aerodynamic interaction in order to address the unique aerodynamic phenomena under shipboard operational conditions, including partial and dynamic ship deck effects and the interaction of the rotor downwash with the ship airwake. Finally, simulation and analysis utilities will be developed to facilitate situational awareness analysis and hazard severity evaluation for assessing the effects of unsteady ship airwake disturbance on the shipboard aircraft operations. The tool developed will benefit military autonomous and manned rotary wing or fixed wing aircraft launch and recovery from a ship. It will also support the process of design, training, and planning. Finally, it will benefit commercial airlines for take-off and landing safety and improvement of operating efficiency.