WARRENTON, Va., 1 June 2007.Athena Technologies Inc., a provider of flight control and navigation systems, announced the successful flight demonstration of damage-tolerant flight control and autonomous landing capabilities on a subscale F/A-18 UAV. The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) sponsored the demonstration at the Aberdeen Proving Grounds in Maryland.
The objective of the test was to prove that adaptive flight controls could regain baseline aircraft performance after the aircraft had sustained simulated battle damage and then safely land the aircraft autonomously with only the onboard INS/GPS functionality of Athena's GuideStar 111m for navigation.
The demonstration involved a subscale F/A-18 UAV, powered by a turbojet engine, that sustained wing battle damage simulated with the in-flight ejection of an aileron. Athena's damage-tolerant controls detected the damage in flight and adapted to the new air vehicle configuration for the effects of the lost aileron, recovering the baseline vehicle performance. The vehicle then successfully landed in the damaged state with Athena's INS/GPS-only autonomous landing system within a few feet of the target touch down point on the airfield runway.
The demonstration highlights the challenge and importance of the ability to autonomously land an air vehicle that has sustained damage. This powerful capability can potentially save the military the expense of lost UAVs and better protect proprietary technology. More importantly, when applied to manned aircraft, the combined technology solution can save lives.
Videos of the flight demonstration can be viewed on Athena's Web site.
