Implementation of a local path planning algorithm for unmanned aerial vehicles

Abstract

As the presence of Unmanned Aircraft Systems (UASs) become more prominent today and in the future. They are used in a variety of ways to solve solutions for a variety of tasks. UASs that are battery-powered typically have a flight time of no more than 30 minutes. Some tasks make take the drone beyond visual line of sight (BVLOS). The approach taken within this paper is allocating a secondary flight computer onboard the UAS to calculate paths while the primary computer controls the aircraft and follows the path being generated. With a proper map of the environment and use of a path planning algorithm the safety of the aircraft can be increased in missions that are BVLOS. This thesis will cover the concepts of path planning algorithms and the development of a modified version of a popular path planning algorithm. Show simulations of comparison with other variations of path planning algorithms and software in the loop (SITL) simulations on a fixed-wing aircraft. It will also show this algorithm's results when implemented in flight tests onboard a fixed-wing and multi-rotor UAS.