Intelligent Damage Adaptive Control for Commercial Air Transports

In situations of unanticipated maneuvers of an aircraft, information must be immediately received by the aircrew for correcting the aircraft flight path to a safe trajectory for continued flight and landing. These maneuvers may be due to failures in the control system, wind gust upsets, or other off-nominal conditions. Also critical are situations of control maneuvers that exceed the normal flight envelope of the aircraft, and providing information to the pilot and control system that will result in safe return to controllable flight. The Intelligent Damage Adaptive Control System (IDACS) operates during flight to detect dangerous conditions of the aircraft and to provide the crew with assistance to restore and to maintain safe control. This system is being developed by Boeing for NASA.