Robust Relative Navigation and Control for Autonomous Ship-Based Landing of Resupply Vertical Take-off and Landing Aircraft

There is a stated need by the Navy to develop and test practical autonomy systems for unmanned air vehicles operating onboard ship decks that leverage recent advances in miniaturization of computing, sensing, perception, and motion planning. The Navy-funded programs "Autonomous Aerial Cargo/Utility System," SBIR Phase II "A System and Testing Methodology for Autonomous Ship-Based Resupply VTOL Aircraft," and "Unmanned Logistics Systems – Air, Joint Capability Technology Demonstration" have developed/are developing generalized, modular systems for rotorcraft autonomy, adaptable to different concepts of operations. Still, current unmanned aircraft systems are limited in their autonomous behavior by insufficient real-time perception and on-board decision-making, and furthermore remotely-piloted systems do not provide low enough latency information or command authority to reliably operate in and out of ship decks in dynamic sea states or degraded visual conditions. This proposal addresses these limitations by leveraging our work on the aforementioned programs to continue development, simulation, flight testing, and field demonstration of an advanced sensing and computing payload to enable an operationally relevant vertical take-off and landing tactical resupply vehicle to autonomously land on moving ship-decks using only on-board closed-loop relative perception, guidance, navigation, and control.