Quantifying Autonomous Soaring on a Surveillance and Communications Relay Mission

Research demonstrates that a surveillance mission is still achievable by unmanned vehicles while performing autonomous soaring.

Naval Research Laboratory, Washington, DC

Missions for small unmanned aircraft (Group 1 and Group 2) include over-the-hill surveillance and providing airborne communications relay points. Greater endurance is almost universally desired by operators to increase the time spent on-station performing the mission and reduce the number and frequency of takeoffs and landings.

Autonomous soaring techniques were first proposed by Wharington and refined by Allen as a method to find convective thermal updrafts and gain altitude energy. While several autonomous soaring algorithms have been implemented on unmanned aircraft and demonstrated significant endurance gains, the technology of autonomous soaring has not yet bridged the gap from research to practical application for a mission.