QUT Researchers Build SUAS to Identify Aircrafts in Flight to Avoid Collision



By Priya Potapragada



Unmanned systems researchers at Australia’s Queensland University of Technology have developed a small UAS with an onboard system that enables the vehicle to use vision to detect another aircraft in flight and avoid it.



In trials, the onboard system delivered real-time warnings to the ground control station, which prevented collision by a manual avoidance maneuver. The aircraft was tested in unsegregated, class G airspace. QUT’s Australian Research Center for Aerospace Automation collaborated with Boeing Research and Technology-Australia and Insitu Pacific carried out the research. The trials were conducted in an airfield northwest of Brisbane. 



Project ResQu, a $7 milllion, two-year project funded by the Queensland Government, QUT, CSIRO, BR&T-A and Insitu Pacific, “aims to fast-track the development of smart technologies that will enable unmanned aircraft to fly safely in the civil airspace," says ARCAA Director, QUT Professor Duncan Campbell. "Ultimately, this will allow UA to provide public services such as assistance in disaster management and recovery, as well as in environmental, biosecurity and resource management."



Andrew Duggan, Insitu Pacific managing director, says, "The team continues to make excellent progress in developing and fielding a world leading system for the safe integration of UAS into commercial airspace. We have a unique capability here in Australia and Queensland specifically to field this technology in viable UAS operations for civilian customers.”