Covert Attritable Aerial Resupply

Currently the Department of the Navy (DON) and broader Department of Defense (DoD) do not have an effective aerial delivery method for small resupply items like food, ammunition, and medical supplies. The Navy relies on large-scale aerial delivery from CH-53E, MV-22B, and MH-60S aircraft. These aircraft require extensive logistical support and coordination, have large radar and audible signatures and are vulnerable to enemy fire putting air crews and supplies at risk. The Navy is seeking novel solutions to refuel, rearm, resupply, repair, and revive distributed naval forces down to the last tactical mile. Distributed forces will lack ground delivery options due to rough terrain and enemy activity. To achieve this end, DON recognizes a Research, Development, Testing, and Evaluation (RDT&E) opportunity with TeamSense AI to provide an autonomous system that can perform diverse aerial expeditionary resupply missions at a cost that is considered attritable in contested environments. Here, TeamSense AI proposes to enhance our modular aerial autonomy system and integrate capabilities on the HoverCrane heavy-lift small unmanned aerial system (sUAS) as a tactical aerial resupply tool for contested logistics operations. During this proposed project, TeamSense will perform the following RDT&E on the HoverCrane platform and demonstrate: Automated onboard drop and landing location selection for ship and shore destinations.Ā Automated mission path planning to reduce probability of interception/detection. Enroute autonomous obstacle detection and avoidance, including confined landing and drop sites. The combination of advanced onboard autonomy and a low cost cargo sUAS delivers the following benefits: Increased Autonomy/Trusted AI: Advanced autonomous aerial cargo shifts responsibility for planning, monitoring, and executing resupply missions from human crew and operators to onboard decision making systems. Appropriate sensors combined with artificial intelligence algorithms can perform tasks such as alternative PNT and identifying drop/landing locations with high reliability, freeing crew for other tasks.Ā Covert Attritable Resupply: Aerial autonomy provides an option to remove manned aviators from hazardous missions in challenging conditions. This inherently reduces risk to aircrew by providing an alternative option for critical resupply in situations where pilot risk assessment is deemed marginal. Small advanced UAS do not require continuous C2 links and are less likely than manned aircraft to be detected or intercepted enroute. Increasing the expected rate of completed resupply tasks.Ā Availability and Response Time: Lower cost, relatively small size and reduced system complexity allows for assets to be positioned at ground locations in close proximity to requested missions. This avoids transit time to and from fixed air bases, lowers inspection/maintenance levels and hastens mission briefings. Significantly reducing time to station and cycle time.