Flight Testing a Heterogeneous Multi-UAV System with Human Supervision

摘要

This paper presents the outdoor flight test results of a decentralized multi-UAV system supervised by a human operator. The system balances the roles of the human operator and the UAV autonomous behaviors with the objective of maximizing the execution performance. The operator manages the mission by inputting and modifying tasks instead of controlling individual UAVs. The Consensus-Based Bundle Algorithm (CBBA) is used as a real-time, scalable, dynamic multi-agent multi-task planning algorithm to allocate tasks approved by the operator to UAVs. A team of three quadrotors and one fixed wing UAV collaborated in an operationally relevant scenario supporting a cargo UAV resupply mission. Thirteen of fourteen multi-UAV outdoor flight test trials successfully accomplished the mission objectives. The framework was shown to be robust to system failures and degradations commonly encountered during field testing primarily because of health monitoring and management tools that were incorporated in the design. Instances of task allocation and path planning churning were observed which are linked to uncertainties of operating outdoors. Lessons learned during flight test operations are highlighted as they are relevant to other similar types of systems and missions.