Quantifying situation awareness for small unmanned aircraft: Towards routine Beyond Visual Line of Sight operations

• Published in: Aeronautical journal 2018-05, Vol.122 (1251), p.733-746
• Main Authors: McAree, O., Aitken, J.M., Veres, S.M.
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• ISSN: 0001-9240; 2059-6464
• DOI: 10.1017/aer.2018.14

A novel statistical model is presented to quantify situation awareness in the operation of small civilian Unmanned Aircraft Systems (UAS). Today, the vast majority of small Unmanned Aircraft Systems (UAS) operation takes place under Visual Line of Sight (VLOS) of a human operator, who is wholly responsible for the safety of the flight. As operation begins to move to Beyond Visual Line of Sight (BVLOS), it is likely that this responsibility will become shared between operator and the increasingly autonomous UAS itself. Before we seek to quantify the safety of such a system, it is beneficial to analyse the safety of existing Visual Line of Sight (VLOS) operations to provide a target level of safety. Prior to considering any on-board decision making, it is essential to ensure that the artificial situation awareness system of a UAS in Beyond Visual Line of Sight (BVLOS) is at least as good as awareness of a human operator. The paper provides a probabilistic theory and model for the high-level abstractions of situation awareness to guide future assessment of BVLOS operations.