Oklahoma State University (OSU) and Vigilant Aerospace Systems recently conducted a demonstration flight that used OSU’s 13-mile beyond visual line-of-sight (BVLOS) corridor east of Stillwater, Oklahoma.

The demonstration, which took place on Oct. 8, evaluated BVLOS capabilities, while also demonstrating Vigilant's latest FlightHorizon software, which provided airspace situational awareness throughout the flight.

The fully autonomous demonstration flight covered more than 18 miles.

The first full exercise of the FAA-authorized 13-mile UAS corridor—located in central Oklahoma—the flight was considered a “major field test” for the latest version of Vigilant Aerospace's management and active detect-and-avoid (DAA) system, FlightHorizon 2.

Starting from OSU’s Center for Forensics Explosives range near Pawnee, Oklahoma, the flight concluded with an autonomous landing at OSU’s Unmanned Aircraft Flight Station in Glencoe, Oklahoma. 

“The unmanned aircraft industry's top needs continue to be autonomous safety systems, on-board detect-and-avoid solutions and better airspace management. This flight allowed us to make progress on all three by demonstrating our system's capabilities over a much longer duration and distance, while providing active alerting and airspace visualization to the pilot and observers,” explains Kraettli L. Epperson, CEO of Vigilant Aerospace.

“These demonstration flights are critical milestones in the development of the industry and our partnership with OSU provides our company access to some of the top students, researchers and facilities in the U.S.”

A proof of concept for Vigilant's Unmanned Traffic Management (UTM) capabilities, which are currently in research and development, was provided from the results of the flight.

The analysis of the results from the demonstrations will not only provide an understanding of the capabilities of autonomous UAS operations, but they will also provide the necessary data for additional use cases.

“This flight and the team of OSU research engineers and students and Vigilant Aerospace staff who conducted it represent a forward-looking approach to utilizing public-private partnerships to rapidly advance the technology and bring innovations to market,” says Jamey Jacob, director of the OSU Unmanned Systems Research Institute (USRI) and John Hendrix Chair Professor in Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering.

Utilizing a twin-motor UAS flying below 400 feet AGL, the flight was conducted under an FAA Certificate of Authorization (COA) with a visual observer. OSU notes that the COA allows for the waiving of rules that require UAS pilots to keep their aircraft continuously in line-of-sight and also provides additional operating altitude.
 
With the COA, OSU and commercial research and development partners such as Vigilant Aerospace can “pioneer new unmanned flight technologies, safety systems and processes to advance the state of the UAS industry,” OSU says.

Vigilant Aerospace used its FlightHorizon 2 software to provide airspace situational awareness, detect-and-avoid and air traffic visualization for the flight. During the flight, the software tracked dozens of manned aircraft across central Oklahoma, and provided the visual observer and pilot-in-command with real-time alerts.

Over the upcoming months, Vigilant Aerospace plans to conduct more test and demonstration flights, incorporating several radar units and additional telemetry data with the goal of developing new ground-based and on-board safety systems for UAS.