Authority Handover Procedure and Safety Decision Strategy in Unmanned Aerial Vehicles

• Autor(a) principal: Ferreira, Gleizielly Alves
• Data de Publicação: 2023
• Tipo de documento: Dissertação
• Idioma: eng
• Título da fonte: Repositórios Científicos de Acesso Aberto de Portugal (RCAAP)
• Texto Completo: http://hdl.handle.net/10400.22/24025
• topic: Unmanned Aerial Vehicles; Beyond Visual Line of Sight; Authority Handover

Over recent years, Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) applications have become popular in different areas, such as aerial image acquisition, agriculture, inspection and maintenance, mapping, and delivery services. Some of these services require the ability to fly UAVs Beyond Visual Line of Sight (BVLOS) to cover greater distances. Data provided by onboard instruments control the BVLOS operation. The flight controller is responsible for directing the drone flight by controlling the motor’s speed and gathering sensor data. The relevant information about the aircraft, such as position, altitude, speed, and direction of flight, are transmitted via a radio link that informs an operator or a Ground Control Station (GCS). In some drone architectures, there is also an extra computer known as a companion computer or mission computer. They are responsible for providing more intelligence to the flight controller by changing flight parameters. The tasks running on a companion computer can add the capacity to make intelligent decisions during autonomous flight or emergencies, for instance, when the drone loses the radio link with GCS. In addition, for complex drone operations in larger coverage areas, it is necessary to transfer wireless communication links from one access point to another without experiencing connectivity loss. This procedure is known as Handover, and there is much research in this area. Therefore, studies in this field are still needed to find better solutions to avoid failures and increase public and regulatory acceptance of BVLOS operations with UAVs. In this context, the thesis intends to address solutions to the security authorization handover procedure and addresses security strategies in case of a loss of connection.