An unmanned vehicle control system is disclosed, comprising a ground control station in operable communication with a plurality of unmanned vehicles via a communications network. The ground control station receives unmanned vehicle mission information and provides a plurality of instructions to the unmanned vehicle to execute a mission including a take-off procedure and a landing procedure. A plurality of microservices process requests from a controller and at least one charging station provides a docking point for the plurality of unmanned vehicles. The charging station provides a power source to the plurality of unmanned vehicles and receives mission information from the ground control station, wherein the unmanned vehicles are operable to deliver a good to a remote location.

Provided are airplane trim systems and methods of controlling such systems. These systems utilize smaller portions of the stabilizer total travel range for takeoff trims, in comparison to other trim systems. A trim system described includes stabilizer and elevator, and these components are used together to achieved a takeoff total tail pitching moment. The elevator or, at least a portion of the elevator operating range, is available for flight control. As such, takeoff trim settings include stabilizer and elevator orientation settings. Addition of the elevator to control the takeoff tail pitching moment allows reducing the stabilizer total travel. The elevator orientation can be changed much faster than that of the stabilizer providing pilot more control.

An on-board computer system includes a first neural network trained to receive a video stream of a landing approach, runway data, and aircraft state data and identify environmental landmarks corresponding to components of the runway and environmental obstacles that might interfere with autonomous landing. The on-board computer system also includes a second neural network that receives a flight path vector and a flight director corresponding to vectors based on the aircraft energy state and a desired aircraft flight path respectively. The second neural network determines flight control inputs to bring the flight path vector into conformity with the flight director.

Drone systems and methods for delayed package delivery includes, in an air traffic control system configured to manage UAV flight in a geographic region, communicating to one or more UAVs over one or more wireless networks; directing a UAV, in transit, to deliver a package to a delivery location and following a flight plan provided to the UAV by the air traffic control system or a drone operator, to hold a position; and directing the UAV to deliver the package after holding the position.

The drone implemented border patrol solution is projected to be more effective at preventing successful border penetrations over very long distances than any attempted solution. It requires functionally zero infrastructure investment. It can be deployed in six months or less and it costs less than $100,000 a mile to implement (vs. 15 million a mile for a physical wall, or 4 million a mile for a virtual fence (a 97% price reduction)).

A control channel allocation method for a flying device comprises: allocating a task to a flying device, wherein the task comprises flight information for the flying device; determining a flight time of the flying device flying from a departure station to an arrival station according to the flight information; searching for one or more control channels at the departure station and the arrival station that are idle during the flight time based on one or more control channel occupation tables as one or more target control channels, wherein the one or more control channel occupation tables store idle states of a plurality of control channels at the departure station and the arrival station during a plurality of periods of time; and allocating the one or more target control channels for controlling the flying device to fly from the departure station to the arrival station.

Autonomous flight is performed in an open loop mode over a first range of altitudes, wherein a plurality altitude-related data from a plurality of altitude-related sensors is ignored while performing the autonomous flight in the open loop mode. The autonomous flight is performed in a closed loop mode over a second range of altitudes, wherein: the plurality of altitude-related data from the plurality of altitude-related sensors is used while performing the autonomous flight in the closed loop mode, and the first range of altitudes is a non-overlapping, lower range of altitudes compared to the second range of altitudes.

An aircraft based object acquisition system includes an airframe capable of flight. The system includes one or more sensors configured to identify a physical characteristic of an object or an environment. An object acquisition mechanism is coupled to the airframe and configured to manipulate and secure the object to the airframe. A ground based movement system may be configured to position the airframe such that the object is accessible to the object acquisition mechanism. A processor is communicatively configured to control operation of the ground based movement system to approach the object based at least in part on information from the one or more sensors, and to control the object acquisition mechanism to pick up the object based at least in part on information from the one or more sensors.

In one embodiment, a method is performed by a computer system in an aircraft. The method includes receiving an advance indication of a take-off or landing event to be executed by the aircraft in proximity to a landing area such that the landing area includes an arrangement of a plurality of emitters of electromagnetic radiation. The method further includes, responsive to the receiving, detecting, via a sensor in communication with the computer system, emission states of at least some of the plurality of emitters. In addition, the method includes transforming the detected emission states into an instruction set for the take-off or landing event. The method also includes initiating monitoring of the aircraft relative to the instruction set as the aircraft executes the take-off or landing event in proximity to the landing area.

A technique for operating unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) in a terminal area from which the UAVs are staged includes charging a plurality of the UAVs on charging pads disposed in a staging array at the terminal area. Merchant facilities for preparing packages for delivery by the UAVs are disposed about a periphery of the staging array. The UAVs are relocated under their own propulsion from interior charging pads to peripheral loading pads of the staging array as the peripheral loading pads become available and the UAVs are deemed sufficiently charged and ready for delivery missions.