Voget, Nicolai (RWTH Aachen University), Krimphove, Johannes (RWTH Aachen University), Moormann, Dieter (RWTH Aachen University)

Flight Planning Using Time Annotated B-Splines for Safe Airspace Integration

Scheduled for presentation during the Regular Session "Trajectory planning" (WeA1), Wednesday, April 3, 2019, 16:00−16:30, Carassa-Dadda

5th CEAS Conference on Guidance, Navigation and Control, April 3-5, 2019, Milano, Italy

This information is tentative and subject to change. Compiled on April 26, 2024

Abstract

Within the near future a high rise of automatic flights of unmanned aerial vehicles beyond visual line of sight is expected. In order to efficiently coordinate these flights, unmanned traffic management systems will require precise information about the planned trajectories. This paper introduces an approach for using time annotated non-uniform B-Splines to represent the 4D trajectory of a UAV. First, it depicts the mathematical requirements for spline based representations that evolve from the dynamic constraints of hybrid aircraft, i.e. UAVs that are able to hover as well as to fly airborne at high speed. We then present a 4D representation by using time as primary parameter of splines. This imposes additional restrictions on the modeling of the used splines. In this paper we show how to fulfill these restrictions for various cases, such as straight line segments under a given acceleration or turns at constant airspeed.