Autonomous Flight Termination Analysis and Real Time Subsequent Debris Impacts

Automated Flight Safety Systems (AFSS) are capable of monitoring vehicle flight path and terminating powered flight when pre-programmed mission rules are violated. Current state of the art AFSS continuously predict the impact point of the forward edge of the debris field based on vacuum propagation. This allows for simplified mission rules that exclude the public from the test area. To allow testing in areas where the public cannot be excluded, a risk based AFSS is required. This proposal describes feasibility testing of real-time trajectory prediction and risk analysis software that is designed to run on a microcontroller processor onboard the vehicle. The software interfaces with an AFSS which provides vehicle tracking and dynamic data, and sends the flight termination command to the vehicle.