The rapid rise in the use of Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) and unmanned system capabilities has led to the need for a single ground station operator to control multiple, heterogeneous UAVs enabled with increasingly complex systems (e.g., laser designation and weapons systems). Given the inherent complexity of these systems, it is critical that control design supports tolerable operator workload and high situation awareness. Within these operational constraints, Playbook control was developed as a UAV employment concept that would allow the operator to command and control multiple UAVs and UAV actions with minimal system input by calling a single, predefined "play." This paper provides a summary of the development of Playbook control for multiple heterogeneous, weaponized UAVs by the U.S. Army Aeroflightdynamics Directorate, SIFT, LLC, and Turpin Technologies under the funding of Unmanned Systems Initiative.
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