The Business section from the January 2015 issue. Download the PDF.
Includes:
The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) is asking for input on how to launch and recover multiple small unmanned air systems (UAS) from existing large aircraft, such as the C-130. It has issued a Request for Information (RFI) seeking technical, security and business insights on “aircraft carriers in the sky.”
In DARPA’s “blended approach,” a large aircraft would host a small UAS and facilitate its operations. The agency says it would be more cost-effective for intelligence, surveillance, reconnaissance (ISR) and other missions.
Safety is another key aspect of the project. While small UAS can reduce putting an aircraft or pilot at risk, DARPA says it may lack the speed, range and endurance of larger aircraft.
“We want to find ways to make smaller aircraft more effective, and one promising idea is enabling existing large aircraft, with minimal modification, to become ‘aircraft carriers in the sky,’” said Dan Patt, DARPA program manager. “We envision innovative launch and recovery concepts for new UAS designs that would couple with recent advances in small payload design and collaborative technologies.”
The RFI is calling for short responses — no more than eight pages — that must address the following three areas:
According to a news release by DARPA, technology development beyond the three areas will be considered if it supports the RFI’s goals.
Proposals are due by 4 p.m. ET on Nov. 26, 2014, to [email protected].
Boris Skopliak, product manager for Trimble, gives an overview of the Trimble UX5 while at the 2014 Trimble Dimensions User Conference, held Nov. 3-5 in Las Vegas, Nevada. The UX5 unmanned aircraft system (UAS) for mapping and surveying captures imagery and can generate point clouds, digital terrain models and orthomosaics.
A few weeks ago at the Esri 2014 International User conference in San Diego, California, we conducted our first live event webinar from a Plexiglas booth sitting among many of the 14,000+ attendees buzzing around inside the San Diego Convention Center.
The webinar focused on high-precision GNSS on mobile devices (iOS/Android/Windows), unmanned aerial systems (UAS), and real-time GIS transactions. These are hot topics in the geospatial world, and that was confirmed when I received about 100 pre-webinar questions and more than 100 post-webinar questions.
In my article this month, I’ll do my best to provide answers to the questions asked. If I don’t get to your question, or if you have another, please email me at [email protected].
First of all, if you didn’t attend the webinar and would like to view the recording, you can register here and you’ll be provided a link to view it. It’s a great, interactive discussion. I grabbed Sharad Garg, iOS consultant, from the Esri show floor to talk about the intricacies and complexities of using GNSS receivers on iPads and iPhones.
Without further delay, following are some of the more popular pre- and post-webinar questions I received.
First, I’ll start with the questions about mobile devices and high-precision GNSS.
1. Will Android be the dominant mobile tablet platform in the Enterprise?
It’s hard to say. I recently met with a group of enterprise IT professionals and we were discussing this issue. Basically, the group was equally divided into thirds. One third were using Android. one third were using iOS, and one third were using Windows.
Android advantages: Lots of mobile devices available that run Android.
Android disadvantages: Open source = non-standard implementations, so app software may not run on every device; security concerns.
iOS advantages: Consistent user interface, consistent software development environment, popularity of iPad and iPhone.
iOS disadvantages: Closed ecosystem (very limited number of tablets); doesn’t interface to devices (such as GNSS) that haven’t been through the Apple certification process; security concerns.
Windows advantages: Security; lots of legacy apps and utilities written for Windows.
Windows disadvantages: Limited number of tablets being deployed based on Windows.
For enterprise organizations, data security is a huge concern. Since Android is open source and gaining the most market share (at least in the consumer market), it’s got a target on its back for hackers. That’s the biggest concern I hear from corporate IT professionals. How will Android device developers address that, or will they? The consumer market for Android devices is exploding regardless of security. Do they even care about the enterprise market? Apparently Apple does as it recently signed an agreement with IBM to address the enterprise market, with IBM committing to deploying more than 100 enterprise solutions for iOS.
2. Which mobile platform is the most universal/easy to integrate with GNSS receivers?
Out of the box, Windows and Windows Mobile devices are still the easiest to interface to external GNSS receivers for the average consumer. Using Bluetooth, serial or USB, NMEA (or proprietary binary) data flows easily via the device com port or virtual com port. If you’re using a Bluetooth interface, there is some inconsistency among mobile devices due to the different versions of Bluetooth management software used on mobile devices, but it’s workable, and worst case you can buy an inexpensive third-party Bluetooth software manager like BlueSoleil.
With the use of an app such as Bluetooth GPS that allows you to select an external GNSS receiver, connecting your Android device to an external Bluetooth GNSS receiver is relatively painless.
Apple products are the toughest to integrate with external GNSS receivers via Bluetooth. Each GNSS receiver has to be specifically designed with an Apple Bluetooth authentication chip and be subjected to the Apple certification process, which can be lengthy and costly. This is the reason why you see very few Bluetooth GNSS receivers available for Apple products. The good news is that once the GNSS receiver is approved, the Bluetooth connection happens automatically when the GNSS receiver is in range of the Apple device. No com port config, no baud rate to worry about, etc.
3. What is available on Android that will make my smartphone a practical and useable tool that can assist in collecting professional data?
First of all, you need to find a high-precision Bluetooth receiver to connect to your Android device. Then, establish the Bluetooth partnership between the Android and GNSS receiver (scan for Bluetooth devices, enter passcode, etc). Once you have that, download the Bluetooth GPS utility I mentioned above and it will allow you to select which GNSS device to use (external vs. internal). Once you’ve selected the external GNSS receiver and connected to it via Bluetooth, every location app on your Android device will use the high-precision GNSS receiver for location.
This applies to an Android tablet or Samsung Galaxy phone. Take a look at this article to see how I ran RTK on a Samsung Galaxy using a Bluetooth RTK receiver.
Today’s challenge is finding “professional” GIS data collection apps that run in the Android environment. There are a few, but the selection is limited. Esri has its Collector for ArcGIS app that runs on Android, but it requires an ArcGIS server backend or ArcGIS Online account. Other data collection apps like Fulcrum and Amigocloud run on Android as cloud-based services.
4. Is there an actual GPS receiver within smartphones, or are they triangulating off of cell towers?
There’s a GNSS receiver in virtually every smartphone manufactured. The GNSS chips are so cheap (a few dollars) compared to the functionality gained that it wouldn’t make sense not to design a GNSS receiver in a smartphone. Now, just because there’s a GNSS chip in each smartphone doesn’t mean it’s the only technology used for location. For example, Apple iOS uses multiple data sources to determine the location at any given time. It will use a combination of cellular triangulation, Wi-Fi IP address, and internal GNSS receiver and external GNSS.
5. Which applications do you see requiring RTK accuracy within the mass-market applications?
A couple of years ago at the GPS World Leadership Dinner at the ION GNSS conference in Nashville, Dr. Todd Humphreys of the University of Texas at Austin predicted that you’ll have RTK (real-time centimeter accuracy) capability on your smartphone by the year 2020. I agree with his prediction, and I think we’ll see inexpensive Bluetooth RTK “pucks” well before 2020, as I’ve written before.
Often, I get the question raised above. Who needs RTK on a mobile phone?
I can’t tell you any more than that in the early 1970s when GPS was first being conceived, not one could tell you what GPS would be used for today. I love the following quote from Steve Jobs: “People don’t know what they want until you show it to them.”
6. Since many devices are complete systems with GNSS inside, do you see the direction of the industry moving towards remote “add-ons” like Bluetooth receivers?
Bluetooth receivers are certainly trending, and it’s primarily driven by the explosion of powerful yet inexpensive tablets and smartphones in the past five years, starting with the iPad/iPhone, and now with Android devices and smartphones in general. People want to use their consumer devices in a professional capacity and some need high-precision GNSS receivers, so that’s driving the demand for “add-ons” like Bluetooth GNSS receivers, laser rangefinders, and more.
Ok, let’s transition to some questions on UAS (such as UAV, drones).
1. Do you see the FAA allowing simple operations for very low altitude UAV-sensors?
It’s difficult to speculate what the FAA will implement, but I have to think, based on its past behavior, that the initial rules will be super-conservative with minimum requirements being that a licensed pilot will be required to operate the UAS in addition to strict equipment requirements.
What’s going to be interesting to observe is what the FAA will do about the hundreds (maybe thousands) of UAS operators who will attempt (or are attempting) to “fly under the radar” and skirt the FAA rules. We’ve seen the FAA attempt (sometimes successfully and sometimes not) to crack down on some UAS operators whom it believes are violating the rules, but there have only been a handful of those cases.
2. When do you think the FAA will release rules for commercial UAV users?
The U.S. Congress-mandated deadline is September 2015. Some sources are doubting the FAA can meet that deadline. The FAA UAS Integration Manager says they will.
I wouldn’t be surprised if the FAA issued some guidelines in September 2015, but I seriously doubt they will publish the full set of rules by then.
By the way, I attended an interesting UAS presentation at the AEC Summit prior to the Esri UC. You can see my write-up of it here.
That’s it for now. I’ve got many more questions from the audience that I’ll address in upcoming newsletters. Stay tuned and feel free to email me directly at [email protected].
Thanks and see you next time.
Follow me on Twitter at https://twitter.com/GPSGIS_Eric
Like it or not, as a person who works with geospatial data, UAS (unmanned aerial systems such as drones and UAVs) are in your future. The upside of said technology for “quick and dirty” mapping is undeniable.
GNSS plays a key role with UAS, just like it plays a key role in classical photogrammetry. In fact, UAS may even push GNSS technology into areas where it hasn’t gone. For example, L1 RTK. I wrote about L1 RTK technology several years ago, and while several products attempted to exploit it, L1 RTK never was adopted in any significant numbers, primarily due to the short baseline, clear sky, and longer initialization requirements. However, UAS may change that because, by their nature, they work with short baselines, clear sky environments and require some setup time, at least enough for L1 RTK initialization.
However, before we get ahead of ourselves, the regulatory machine (the Federal Aviation Administration) must publish regulations that provide guidelines on the use of UAS for commercial operations. In June, amidst its recent enforcement actions, the FAA issued its first commercial authorization for mapping UAS over land in the U.S. The FAA issued a Certificate of Waiver or Authorization (CoA) to BP to conduct aerial surveys in Prudhoe Bay, Alaska. According to the FAA, the first flights took place on June 8 and used a AeroEnvironment 13.5 lb. Puma AE fixed-wing UAS with a nine-foot wingspan.
According to a Wall Street Journal article, AeroEnvironment spokesman Steve Gitlin said it took about a year and considerable financial investment to win FAA approval for the BP project. Curt Smith, a director in BP’s technology office, said that manned aircraft are sometimes less expensive per flight than the AeroVironment devices, but that the drones will gather far more data, enabling BP to operate “more effectively, more safely, and at a lower cost.”
The FAA announced that last summer that it issued restricted category type certificates to the Puma and Insitu’s Scan Eagle, another small UAS. The certificates were limited to aerial surveillance only over Arctic waters. The FAA recently modified the data sheet of the Puma’s restricted category type certificate to allow operations over land after AeroVironment showed that the Puma could perform such flights safely.
Texas A&M University Becomes Fourth Operational UAS Test Site
In further UAS news, the FAA announced on June 20 that Texas A&M University – Corpus Christi became the fourth of six UAS test sites to become operational. The FAA issued a CoA for the university to use an 85 lb AAAI RS-16 UAS with a ~13-foot wingspan. The other five UAS test sites are Griffiss (NY) International Airport, North Dakota Department of Commerce, State of Nevada, University of Alaska, and Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University.
The FAA UAS Legal Stuff
Despite its setback when an NTSB administrative law judge ruled against the FAA in March 2013, the FAA sternly maintains its position that commercial operations of UAS in the U.S. are strictly prohibited without a CoA. In fact, just this week (June 23), the FAA issued a press release about a Federal Register Notice the FAA published of its interpretation of UAS rules for model aircraft in the FAA Modernization and Reform Act of 2012. In the Act, the Sec. 336 Special Rule for Model Aircraft reads:
SEC. 336. SPECIAL RULE FOR MODEL AIRCRAFT
(a) IN GENERAL.—Notwithstanding any other provision of law relating to the incorporation of unmanned aircraft systems into Federal Aviation Administration plans and policies, including this subtitle, the Administrator of the Federal Aviation Administration may not promulgate any rule or regulation regarding a model aircraft, or an aircraft being developed as a model aircraft, if—
(1) the aircraft is flown strictly for hobby or recreational use;
(2) the aircraft is operated in accordance with a community-based set of safety guidelines and within the programming of a nationwide community-based organization;
(3) the aircraft is limited to not more than 55 pounds unless otherwise certified through a design, construction, inspection, flight test, and operational safety program administered by a community-based organization;
(4) the aircraft is operated in a manner that does not interfere with and gives way to any manned aircraft; and
(5) when flown within 5 miles of an airport, the operator of the aircraft provides the airport operator and the airport air traffic control tower (when an air traffic facility is located at the airport) with prior notice of the operation (model aircraft operators flying from a permanent location within 5 miles of an airport should establish a mutually-agreed upon operating procedure with the airport operator and the airport air traffic control tower (when an air traffic facility is located at the airport)).
(b) STATUTORY CONSTRUCTION.—Nothing in this section shall be construed to limit the authority of the Administrator to pursue enforcement action against persons operating model aircraft who endanger the safety of the national airspace system.
(c) MODEL AIRCRAFT DEFINED.—In this section, the term ‘‘model aircraft’’ means an unmanned aircraft that is—
(1) capable of sustained flight in the atmosphere;
(2) flown within visual line of sight of the person operating
(3) the aircraft; and
(4) flown for hobby or recreational purposes.
You can read more (lots more) about the FAA’s interpretation of the Act here. You can submit a comment on the FAA’s interpretation of the Act here. The comment period ends July 25.
More FAA UAS Legal Stuff
On June 25, the FAA issued a press release announcing that seven aerial photo and video production companies requested regulatory exemptions from the FAA to operate UAS before the FAA UAS rule-making is finalized. According to the FAA, “the Motion Picture Association of America facilitated the exemption requests on behalf of their membership. The firms that filed the petitions are all independent aerial cinematography professionals who collectively developed the exemption requests as a requirement to satisfy the safety and public interest concerns of the FAA, MPAA, and the public at large.”
From the FAA press release, “The FAA published a brief summary of the petition from Astraeus Aerial in the Federal Register. The agency opted to ask for comments only on the Astraeus petition because that company’s request came in first, and the petitions from the other six companies ask for identical exemptions.”
Interestingly enough, the FAA is soliciting public comment before it makes a ruling on the MPAA request, clearly highlighting the tremendous pressure the FAA is under to integrate commercial use of UAS in the U.S.
More Commercial Use of UAS Despite what the FAA Says
Back in February, I wrote an article entitled FAA Says Commercial Drone Operations Are Illegal… Public Says So What? discussing the expanding use of UAS in the commercial sector before the FAA rule-making on UAS was completed. To compound the FAA’s challenge, in March an NTSB Administrative Law Judge ruled against the FAA in an enforcement action the FAA attempted to impose on Rafael Pirker: a fine of $10,000 for commercial use of UAS and other violations.
The NTSB ruling against the FAA fueled the commercial UAS fire and certainly gave commercial UAS operators, operating illegally according to the FAA, more confidence that the FAA may not pursue them. That might be the case in an incident publicized last week in Seattle, Washington, where a woman called police after she saw a UAS buzzing around outside of her apartment building, believing it was spying on her 26th-floor apartment. The Portland, Oregon-based UAS operator, Skyris Imaging, was interviewed by Portland’s KATU news.
“It was not our intent to view anything other than the views from a 20-story office building that will be built across the street,” said Skyris’s Joe Vaughn. Vaughn told KATU that a Seattle-based developer hired Vaughn’s company to use one of his drones equipped with cameras to take photos of the view for a new 20-story building.
Vaughn told KATU that his company has a fleet of six drones he says he responsibly flies. He told KATU that his company has strict guidelines to never fly for a third party, over crowds, above 400 feet, or beyond visual range. Click below to view the KATU interview.
Live Webinar at the Esri International User Conference
In a GPS World first, we’ll be producing a live webinar from the Esri International User Conference on Thursday, July 17, @ 10 a.m. Pacific Time in the exhibit hall at the San Diego Convention Center. Of course, the webinar will be focused on one of the hottest topics: high-precision mobile GIS. It will cover high-precision GNSS on mobile devices, from iPads to Android tablets to smartphones.
Tune in or join us live from the exhibit hall floor! Register here.
Thanks, and see you next month.
Follow me on Twitter at https://twitter.com/GPSGIS_Eric
GPS World (GPSW): In the regulatory picture for unmanned autonomous vehicles (UAVs), what are the concerns for the GNSS research, design, and manufacturing community regarding air-space regulation?
Graham Purves (GP): The main concern is the scope and impact of certification requirements for UAV navigation systems in the National Air Space. Certification places constraints on software complexity, so it is difficult to define solutions if the certification framework is unclear.
In the context of current avionics for civil aviation, design standards and certification requirements are well defined. In the case of pilot-less aircraft, the navigation systems may make use of additional features and technologies that are not part of the current certification paradigm. Examples are tightly coupled inertial navigation systems (INS) for flight control and redundancy, and real-time kinematic (RTK) and differential GPS for landing and capture. Certification requirements and design assurance levels for these features will have a major impact on the definition and design process, and may even prevent some effective technical solutions from being used, due to the software complexity. Of course, communications and communication standards will also present a significant hurdle.
GPSW: What are the concerns for the GNSS research, design, and manufacturing community regarding vehicle/road regulation for UGVs?
GP: Similar answer. The software used in positioning and navigation systems is significantly more complex than the safety-critical software in current automotive systems. Regulation for UGVs may result in restrictive certification requirements that affect or prohibit the use of more complex software. Until we have a clear understanding of the certification framework, it is difficult to define technical solutions.
GPSW: In looking forward to the Federal Aviation Administration tests at six sites for integrating unmanned aerial vehicles into the commercial airspace safely, what are some of the technical challenges that you (and presumably NovAtel’s partners) are facing?
GP: We have proven some excellent technical solutions in the non-civil applications and believe the main barrier is not a technical but a regulatory challenge.
GPSW: What other pieces/technologies do you have to pull into the UAV/UGV integration to make it work? Inertial, certainly. What else?
GP: The UAV/UGV application is a very interesting arena for other positioning technologies that either augment or complement GNSS. Apart from navigation and auto-pilot functions, we believe the sense-and-avoid functions will require other sensing technologies, like scanning lasers. When you include the mission-related functions that require precise steering, pointing and measuring systems, the UAV/UGV is a very exciting category for companies like NovAtel.
GPSW: Is UAV/UGV a game-changer for the GNSS industry? Similar to the cellphone/smartphone implementation of GNSS chips, which created a whole new sector?
GP: It does have two elements that might be considered game-changers:
Graham Purves has been active in the GNSS industry since 1990, starting in ASIC development and continuing with various technical and business positions within NovAtel over the last 26 years.
Unmanned Aircraft Navigation
Sponsored by: Hemisphere GNSS
Original Broadcast Date: Thursday, November 21, 2013
Moderator: Tony Murfin, Editor, Professional OEM newsletter
Speakers: Olivier Casabianca, Business Area Manager, Trimble GNSS OEM; Hal Adams, Co-founder/Chief Operating Officer, Accord Technology; Neil Gerein, Defense Product Manager, NovAtel; Eric Brewer, Senior Systems Engineer, Rockwell Collins; and Howard William Loewen, President, MicroPilot Inc.
Summary: In recent years, there has been explosive growth in the Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) market segment, with most on-board navigation systems relying on GNSS or GNSS with inertial aiding. As military budgets decline, interest in civilian commercial applications is growing rapidly. The FAA recently awarded special type certification to two UAVs for commercial Arctic operations, and the industry is now poised for the opening of the regulation floodgates to address a growing commercial demand. In this webcast, we will hear from some of the industry leaders in GNSS-based navigation for UAVs, in both the military and civilian sectors: they will tell us what they are doing in UAV navigation and where they see this exciting market going.
Topcon Positioning Group has released and made available in Europe the Topcon SIRIUS PRO powered by MAVinci, an Unmanned Aerial System (UAS) designed to produce the most accurate solutions for automated mapping of construction sites, pipelines, disaster areas, mines, quarries and myriad sites without regard to terrain.
During October 2013, Topcon Europe Positioning (TEP) entered into a strategic partnership with UAS provider MAVinci GmbH. The result of that partnership is the release of the fixed-wing UAS Topcon SIRIUS PRO powered by MAVinci.
“We are excited to announce our distribution agreement with Topcon. This partnership is the ideal expansion of our global distribution network,” Johanna Claussen, CEO at MAVinci GmbH said. “The simple operation of our UAS from flight planning to the final orthophoto and DEM (Digital Elevation Model), allows flexible use in highly demanding environments. Its flexible assisted auto-pilot landing mode enables navigation around any unforeseen obstacles.”
Based in St. Leon Rot, Germany, MAVinci is a aerial surveying company specializing in the development of UAS technology.
“By adding Topcon’s RTK solutions to the UAS and ground control station, the SIRIUS PRO is the first commercially available UAS that can reach 5-cm accuracy without the need for ground control points,” said Sander Jongeleen, mobile mapping product manager for Topcon Positioning Group. “This leads to an enormous reduction of operational cost and allows mapping of areas that are not easily accessible with high accuracy.”
The SIRIUS PRO is a fixed-wing UAS capable of producing high quality and pre-positioned aerial photography without the need of extensive ground control that is required by competitive products. Key features include:
Applanix Corporation and American Aerospace Advisors have completed a successful series of test flights of AAAI’s RS-16 platform equipped with Applanix’ DMS-UAV aerial photogrammetry payload. This is the first successful mission for a long-endurance UAS (unmanned aerial system) capable of producing professional-grade, directly georeferenced mapping imagery for civilian applications such as pipeline monitoring, power line and emergency response mapping.
Tests were conducted over restricted airspace in the state of New Jersey. A joint team from Applanix and AAAI planned and flew a sequence of missions to evaluate the capabilities of the UAS. These include, critically, the ability to provide highly accurate, directly georeferenced and orthorectified aerial imagery without the need for ground control points or aerial triangulation calculations. The system, consisting of the airframe, its avionics, mobile ground control station and the digital mapping payload, performed according to expectations and successfully produced high-quality imagery.
“Performing safe and successful missions with long endurance unmanned aircraft in civilian airspace are a challenge that goes far beyond selecting the right aircraft and payload,” said David Yoel, CEO of American Aerospace Advisors. “Working with Applanix, we have produced an integrated system that is designed from the ground up with civilian mapping operations in mind. We believe this system has the capability to transform the aerial mapping industry.”
The RS-16 DMS is a complete, operational system capable of conducting large area operations within the National Airspace System in the United States, and in other jurisdictions as local regulations allow. Within the USA, AAAI is engaged with several of the recently announced UAS research and test sites, which operate under the auspices of the FAA to develop the certification and operational requirements necessary to safely integrate UAS into the national airspace.
The GNSS-Inertial systems at the core of Applanix’ DMS-UAV aerial mapping payload uses commercial inertial technologies that are offered globally.
“The market for airborne imaging systems is in a state of rapid change,” said Joe Hutton, director of Inertial Technology and Airborne Products at Applanix. “Developments in imaging technology, in processing capability, and in the nature of inertial sensors, make a directly georeferenced UAS a reality today, where it would have been inconceivable even a few years ago. Our ability to take our established market-leading manned solutions, and integrate the technology successfully into an unmanned platform, speaks volumes for the engineering expertise of Applanix and AAAI.”
On November 7, the FAA released a new roadmap for the “Integration of Civil Unmanned Aircraft Systems (UAS) in the National Airspace System (NAS)” — which it is hoped will provide improved guidance for those extremely interested operators, manufacturers, systems suppliers and those with pending civilian applications of unmanned aircraft.
The forward to the Roadmap by FAA Administrator Michael Huerta says,
‘This roadmap outlines the actions and considerations needed to enable UAS integration into the NAS. The roadmap also aligns proposed FAA actions with Congressional mandates from the FAA Modernization and Reform Act of 2012. This plan also provides goals, metrics, and target dates for the FAA and its government and industry partners to use in planning key activities for UAS integration.”
The FAA, acting through the Unmanned Aircraft Systems Integration Office, aims to enable the integration of UAS safely and efficiently into the NAS. To do so, the FAA is working with stakeholders — manufacturers, vendors, industry trade associations, technical standards organizations, academic institutions, research and development centers, governmental agencies, and other regulators.
The premise is that UAS will be allowed to operate in the NAS, but in so doing cannot reduce existing capacity or decrease safety, cannot negatively impact current operators/operations, and cannot increase the risk to airspace users or people or property on the ground — any more than the integration of other new or novel technology. While progress has so far been significant, many challenges and opportunities apparently lie ahead.
Up to the recent Restricted Type Certification of a couple of unmanned aircraft systems by FAA — namely the Boeing/Insitu Scan Eagle and the AeroVironment’s Puma AE — operators have been and still are required to apply to the FAA for individual Certificates of Authorization (CoA) for each and every U.S. application of UAS. The FAA Roadmap is intended to provide an initial estimate of timing and to list tasks and considerations that will ultimately enable UAS integration into the NAS for the planning purposes of the UAS community.
Commercial operations that the FAA envisages include:
Other commercial and public applications that the FAA might also want to add to the increasing demand for airspace access include:
Of course, the FAA controls an ever increasingly complex airspace to which certified manned aircraft already have regulated access – it’s only fitting that existing safety and commercial use be primarily maintained and in no way compromised. Successful demonstration of UAS to achieve demanding communications, navigation, and surveillance performance will be essential.
The Roadmap quotes the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) Circular 328, “Unmanned Aircraft Systems (UAS) Circular”:
“A number of Civil Aviation Authorities (CAA) have adopted the policy that UAS must meet the equivalent levels of safety as manned aircraft… In general, UAS should be operated in accordance with the rule governing the flight of manned aircraft and meet equipment requirements applicable to the class of airspace within which they intend to operate…To safely integrate UAS in non-segregated airspace, the UAS must act and respond as manned aircraft do. Air Traffic, Airspace and Airport standards should not be significantly changed. The UAS must be able to comply with existing provisions to the greatest extent possible.”
Another significant FAA statement:
“Except for some special cases, such as small UAS (sUAS) with very limited operational range, all UAS will require design and airworthiness certification to fly civil operations in the NAS.”
So, having set the tone that UAS will have to grow up in a major way to become equivalent to existing manned aircraft and to comply with virtually the same rules, the Roadmap goes on to provide much more detail of what will be required.
The FAA is working on UAS regulations — this is not really a big surprise. It would seem that there is significant effort underway to get rules in place, detailed rules which not everyone in the UAS industry will welcome. One scenario is that the huge range of UAS suppliers that we see regularly at the AUVSI annual convention/exhibit could be slimmed down if the market indeed transitions to commercial operations from the current level of military applications, and only the big companies who can afford to comply will remain. Reduced competition usually means increased costs for users, so this may not sit well with the market.
Then there are more difficulties in adapting existing airborne regulations for commercial aircraft to UAS and UAS applications. An example is given of regulations for commercial transport cockpit doors — what’s a “cockpit” when you think of UAS, and where’s the “door” for a ground-based control system in a mobile trailer, or a handheld iPad flying a small quad-rotor air vehicle? (Maybe a different thought process is required here.)
Then the air-traffic control system has to absorb flight of unmanned aircraft in an already overcrowded route network system. Of course, only some UAS operations will be intertwined with regular commercial transport air traffic, but there are huge numbers of “less-disciplined” General Aviation fixed-wing and rotor aircraft with which UAS are bound to interact. So ATC has to understand, control and regulate that interaction. Surely these are common-sense statements which most people would support?
Major technology challenges are anticipated due to the absence of an on-board pilot.
“Removing the pilot from the aircraft creates a series of performance considerations between manned and unmanned aircraft that need to be fully researched and understood to determine acceptability and potential impact on safe operations in the NAS.”
There’s that dreaded word — “researched.” For anyone in the business of selling UAS or UAS systems, including GNSS-based guidance systems, the need for potentially prolonged research may spell death for a nascent business, currently bursting with potential!
Development of Sense and Avoid and Control and Communications (C2) systems with adequate performance are seen as the principle challenges, so a phased introduction of UAS is anticipated while these core systems are fielded and matured over a lengthy period. The current CoA approach is termed “accommodation,” while evolution is expected towards more compliant vehicles and systems during the integration phase — ultimately, with fewer and fewer CoAs. Although the Roadmap talked about “broad timelines,” this key section doesn’t try to predict how long this all might take.
The FAA summarizes the accommodation phase as:
The Integration phase is characterized by adoption of FAA regulations through certification of compliant UAS and UAS systems — the balance between CoA operations and regular operations in the NAS shifts toward more compliant, and presumably more unrestricted, access within FAA regulations. With UAS and UAS systems achieving airworthiness certificates, and trained and certificated UAS pilots filing regular flight plans for UAS operations, integration moves towards adoption. “All UAS must file and fly an IFR flight plan.” Lessons learned in earlier phases are moved into updated regulations and incorporated into equipment capabilities, and certificated UAS get increasingly better access to the airspace they require.
FAA also makes mention that in the integration phase, the six proposed UAS FAA test ranges will be selected. This has been in the works for considerable time. The assessment of proposals and award of contracts had initially been delayed on the basis of privacy questions, but these now appear to have been adequately addressed to allow these key parts of the UAS integration program to move ahead. A principle objective of the test ranges is to help provide a verification mechanism for safe operations before unmanned aircraft are integrated into the NAS. Tasks envisaged include development and proving of:
Integration will have been successfully established when new operational rules and associated standards, policies, and procedures have been established for small UAS and other UAS, and C2 link standards have been defined for integrity, latency, and continuity. FAA will also need to have accepted Minimum Aircraft System Performance Specifications (MASPS) to enable development of detailed MOPS and the FAA should have published policy and operational guidance to define acceptable methods to comply with operational rules in accordance with an acceptable UAS certification basis for each applicant, along with flight-crew training and certification standards.
For the final “Evolutionary” phase of adoption of UAS, it’s expected that there will be seamless operations of certified UAS and crew members in the evolving NAS; FAA will have published Type Standard Orders (TSOs) based on system level MOPS; and certified Sense and Avoid algorithms will be available for collision avoidance and self-separation that are interoperable with evolving NextGen ATC systems and manned collision avoidance systems.
Quite a long list of extensive requirements to meet for a new industry that, so far, has been largely unregulated and has, so far, been used to providing rapid military/governmental solutions that prove themselves operationally over time. More empirical development to satisfy specific operational needs than compliance to published regulations. This isn’t exactly a sea-state change for the industry as it sits today, but perhaps rather a shift into another dimension.
To even get itself onto this road, let alone follow this extensive 74-page roadmap, the UAS industry may have to completely re-invent itself. But with military sales declining, the funding to take on even the simplest of these requirements may be drying up. The tendency for operators may be to try to cling to the CoA system indefinitely and just live with the hassle of applying for FAA authorization each time. FAA’s seeding of commercial applications using Restricted Type Certification of existing platforms that use existing uncertified systems and payloads may also be a way out for some time. If the Scan Eagle can gain limited access to take on commercial, paying applications because it has +800,000 proven military flight hours, eventually other UAS may also creep into some sort of equivalent eligibility. And if we manage to operate safely without major headlines, the FAA may relent in some of its extensive requirements.
Then again, the FAA just published a rather extensive roadmap, with separate backup, which says it has other ideas in mind….
I asked a couple of industry experts what they thought of the Roadmap. One comment was, “To me the real challenge is flexibility in the plan such that it will be a reasonable process to adapt to changes based on findings, experiences as this goes forward.” I agree, and believe that the FAA has gone to some length to make it clear that this is the first issue of the Roadmap, that there will be updates as more is learned. The whole process is one of learning from what has gone before in earlier stages.
Please join us Thursday, November 21, for a GPS World webcast on Unmanned Aircraft Navigation. We’ll have a number of industry leaders who will present their companies’ experience and capabilities in navigation for UAS, along with how they see this exciting market segment progressing, and how the FAA’s plans could impact their vision of the future for UAS navigation systems suppliers. Register today for free.
Tony Murfin
GNSS Aerospace
Unmanned aerial vehicles and civil aircraft may co-habit the airspace after September 2015.
As the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) moves ahead with plans for unmanned aerial systems/vehicles (UAS/UAV) to have regular access to U.S. airspace by 2015, it has encountered several barriers. For UAVs to be treated like manned aircraft, their systems likley need to be qualified to the same standards as civil avioncs. This is a challenge, as each UAS has largely unique systems. UAS equipment standards are emerging, but threats to GNSS abound, requiring defense/mitigation.
Demand for UAS has produced many different types flying in a range of applications. With no apparent standard avionics fit or uniform safety standards, each UAS type is basically configured for specific tasks. Commercial UAS applications continue to emerge, and major market growth is anticipated. One forecast indicates that the UAS market could reach $7.26 billion this year alone. The promise of new and better ways to reduce costs, improve safety, and increase operational efficiency feeds market expansion.
However, in the United States the FAA currently requires each UAS commercial project desiring access to controlled airspace to obtain an FAA-approved Certificate of Authorization. While the FAA has made efforts to speed up approvals, this process slowed widespread commercial adoption of UAS. Nevertheless, opportunities abound in pipeline and transmission line inspection, crop spraying, law enforcement, security, and surveillance, survey/mapping, remote area mail delivery, and hundreds of other applications. The FAA may have felt some pressure to move forward, because Congress has put in place the Modernization and Reform Act of 2012, which calls on the FAA to fully integrate unmanned systems, including those for commercial use, into the national airspace by September 2015.
UAS in the NAS. Meanwhile, a project called the Unmanned Aircraft Systems Integration in the National Airspace System (UAS in the NAS), undertaken by NASA’s Dryden Flight Research Center, seeks to reduce technical barriers related to safety and operational challenges associated with enabling routine UAS access to the NAS.
Europe has also launched a study on the integration of UAS in non-segregated airspace for the future Single European Sky. The ICONUS study will be carried out by a consortium within the European air traffic management program called Single European Sky ATM Research Programme (SESAR). The study will drive the definition of the requirements, capabilities, and equipment which UAS will need to operate safely and efficiently in the coming European SESAR environment.
The U.S. RTCA SC-203 committee is drafting UAS operational requirements, and there has been significant progress towards publishing Minimum Aviation Performance Standards (MASPS), including requirements for navigation. Europe has similar activities underway aimed at improving UAS access to its airspace.
MOPS. The big picture is that requirements for unmanned aircraft are being brought into conformance with the standards applied to the performance and behavior of manned aircraft. Navigation requirements for UAS are expected to specify that systems will need to be qualified to Minimum Operational Performance Standards (MOPS). This means that on-board electronics, including GNSS systems, will probably need to be FAA Technical Standard Orders (TSO) qualified, just as they are now for manned aircraft.
Why do we need to investigate certified avionics now? In the scheme of avionics, more than two years breathing space to certify UAS avionics systems is not a long time, not at all, until the September 2015 deadline. FAA airborne software and hardware qualification will take much time and effort to implement, and re-configuration of systems, interfaces, and operating procedures may take even longer.
For Manufacturers. UAS makers have the option to move forward in stages. For instance, by selecting a few existing airborne-qualified OEM avionics, they could minimize the internal effort to comply. As the first UAS with certified avionics emerge, they will probably get good support from FAA to adopt U.S. operating rules for the NAS. Embedding an existing certified GPS receiver in UAS avionics will reduce the internal work needed and allow more effort for developing commercial market opportunities that look to quickly adopt UAS.
Meanwhile, efforts are in full swing to change the U.S. and European navigation landscapes over the next few years. So it would be better to be ready with a capable GNSS receiver that is already built to meet the challenges of NextGen and SESAR.
GPS III and Galileo. The L5 civil GPS frequency may be operational around the time that UAS unrestricted access becomes possible. GPS L1/L5 dual-frequency operations will enable higher navigation accuracy, reliablity, and integrity. The FAA is already developing NextGen WAAS to include L5, and revisions to the GPS MOPS to include L5 should begin shortly, in time for a usable GPS L5 constellation in 2015/2016. The FAA is already preparing for L5 avionics, and industry investigative work is underway. Its possible that GPS L1/L5 may meet the accuracy and integrity requirements for CAT II/III automated landings. In Europe, Eurocae work is expected to gain momentum for the Galileo E1/E5a MOPS as the Galileo satellite navigation system becomes operational.
The new GNSS environment also includes WAAS/SBAS precision approach (localizer performance with vertical guidance, or LPV) capability: LPV is available now in the United States and will soon be in wider operation in Europe. Automatic Dependendant Surveillance (ADS-B) is rolling out in the United States and around the world. ADS-B is being mandated within the U.S. NAS as the means for air-traffic control to track all aircraft, so UAS avionics will need to include certified ADS-B Out capability.
In one commercial instance, the Septentrio AiRx2 receiver comes out of the box as a certified L1 GPS with ADS-B and WAAS LVP, but is also ready for GPS L5 and Galileo E1/E5a.
Even as greater steps forward enhance how GNSS is used in this wider definition of aviation that will soon include UAS, a team at the University of Texas demonstrated how a UAV could be maliciously side-tracked (see article on page 30 of this issue) — reminiscent of the Iranian downing of a U.S. surveillance drone in December 2011.
Admittedly the GPS on the vehicle in the UT test was not a qualified airborne receiver, but how could this happen when there was also an inertial sensor and a radio-altimeter on the UAV? A good question, which UAV manufacturers will need to consider when they implement their on-board Kalman filters, knowing that spoofing is now an additional threat to parry.
Couldn’t we detect that high-power RF spoofing signal at the front-end of the GPS receiver? Even if only to tell the on-board systems that there could be hazardous misleading information about? Or run separate GPS and GPS/inertial position solutions, detect significant divergence, and set the same warning flag? And multi-constellation, multi-frequency receivers, and even controlled radiation pattern antennas — all things to investigate. More work for the aviation receiver guys who labor tirelessly to improve GNSS integrity.
Of course if you hijack a UAV with a high-power spoofer, you are also spoofing civil transports operating in the same airspace, so now there is the potential to trigger a Federal investigation. It will probably be easier to detect this stuff with moving airborne sensors rather than the fixed ground equipment used to find jammers on trucks at Newark airport, and lots of pilots likely providing real-time location information on radios if their GPS goes even a little haywire. All would help to quickly locate and shut down any spoofer. Nevertheless, it’s a threat to be mitigated.
Fatal Crash. In South Korea, the effects of intermittent North Korean jamming of GPS to disrupt seal, land, and air navigation in the South may have contributed to the recent fatal crash of a Schiebel Camcopter S-100 drone, a 150-kilogram rotorcraft capable of 220 km/h flight. It should have coped with loss of GPS as the Camcopter has multiple inertial measurement units that allow safe operation and recovery in the absence of GPS signals. Emergency procedures to ensure a safe recovery in such a situation do not appear to have been correctly and adequately followed, manufacturer Schiebel alleges.
NovAtel may have found one way to help mitigate spoofing on UAVs; the company released a combined civil/SAASM GPS receiver, the OEM625S, aimed specifically at UAVs. Granted, the idea is to add SAASM anti-spoofing capability to a number of UAVs which currently use NovAtel commercial receivers, mostly in military systems. That may be motivated by the desire to avoid further Iranian incidents!
BAE Systems has been thinking of giving GPS a back-up for just those situations where jamming or even spoofing is detected. BAE’s Navigation via Signals of Opportunity (NAVSOP) system was just announced at the Farnborough air show in the UK and is still in research phase, but looks extremely promising. It interrogates the radio environment for the ID and signal strength of local digital TV and radio signals, plus air traffic control radars, with finer grained adjustments coming from cellphone masts and Wi-Fi routers. Mapping the location of all these sources might be quite an undertaking, and given that these are all non-safety-of-life commercial signals, the sources are subject to the vagaries of power outages, regular maintenance, and breakdowns. Nevertheless, with such a multitude of signals, NAVSOP could well turn out to be a viable back-up for GNSS.
So, shared access to civil airspace, wider applications in commercial operations, and changes in equipment qualification, along with potential solutions for GNSS jamming and spoofing: lots to consider for the UAS industry.
U.S. House of Representatives Committee on Homeland Security; Subcommittee on Oversight, Investigations, and Management; Hearing, July 19, 2012: Using Unmanned Aerial Systems Within the Homeland: Security Game Changer?
Testimony by Todd E. Humphreys, Ph.D.; Assistant Professor, Cockrell School of Engineering, The University of Texas at Austin. [Excerpted. Prof. Humphreys is a co-author of the article “Drone Hack” in the August issue of GPS World.]
The vulnerability of civil GPS to spoofing has serious implications for civil unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), as was recently illustrated by a dramatic remote hijacking of a UAV at White Sands Missile Range.
Hacking a UAV by GPS spoofing is but one expression of a larger problem: insecure civil GPS technology has over the last two decades been absorbed deeply into critical systems within our national infrastructure. Besides UAVs, civil GPS spoofing also presents a danger to manned aircraft, maritime craft, communications systems, banking and finance institutions, and the national power grid.
Constructing from scratch a sophisticated GPS spoofer like the one developed by the University of Texas is not easy. It is not within the capability of the average person on the street, or even the average Anonymous hacker. But the emerging tools of software-defined radio and the availability of GPS signal simulators are putting spoofers within reach of ordinary malefactors.
There is no quick, easy, and cheap fix for the civil GPS spoofing problem. What is more, not even the most effective GPS spoofing defenses are foolproof. But reasonable, cost-effective spoofing defenses exist which, if implemented, will make successful spoofing much harder.
I recommend that for non-recreational operation in the national airspace civil UAVs exceeding 18 lbs be required to employ navigation systems that are spoof-resistant.
More broadly, I recommend that GPS-based timing or navigation systems having a non-trivial role in systems designated by DHS as national critical infrastructure be required to be spoof-resistant.
Finally, I recommend that the DHS commit to funding development and implementation of a cryptographic authentication signature in one of the existing or forthcoming civil GPS signals.
Complete testimony (PDF) covers:
• Jamming-to-noise sensing defense;
• Defense based on SSSC or NMA on WAAS signals;
• Multi-system multi-grequency defense;
• Single-antenna defense;
• Defense based on spread-spectrum security codes on L1C;
• Defense based on navigation message authentication on L1C, L2C, or L5;
• Correlation prole anomaly defense;
• Multi-antenna defense;
• Defense based on cross-correlation with military signals.