Determining a region of impact of an aircraft in the event of an emergency

Abstract

A device for determining a region of impact of an aircraft on the surface of the Earth in the event of an emergency is configured to compare weather forecasts from the past with the weather conditions that are actually occurring and to determine therefrom an uncertainty of the weather forecasts using statistical means. This uncertainty of the weather forecasts is used in addition to position data and state information of the aircraft in order to determine a probable region of impact of the aircraft.

Claims

1. A device for determining a region of impact with a point of impact of an unmanned aircraft on the surface of the Earth in the event of an emergency in which the aircraft approaches the surface of the Earth in an uncontrolled manner or crashes, the device comprising: a first interface configured to receive aircraft data from the aircraft, wherein the aircraft data includes at least a position of the aircraft and an altitude above the surface of the Earth; a second interface configured to receive weather data from a weather information source in a recurring process comprising multiple individual receiving steps, wherein the weather data is weather forecasts and prevailing weather data, and wherein the weather data includes at least air movements in an altitude profile between the aircraft and the surface of the Earth; wherein the device is configured to store the weather data that is received; wherein the device furthermore comprises a computing unit configured to compare the weather forecasts from a preceding receiving step with prevailing weather data from a following receiving step and to determine a deviation between the weather forecasts for a point in time and the weather data actually prevailing at the point in time, to thereby determine an uncertainty of the weather forecast; wherein the computing unit is configured to determine the region of impact of the aircraft on the surface of the Earth in the event of an emergency based upon the weather forecast for the point in time of the emergency, the deviation between the weather forecasts for the point in time from a preceding receiving step and the weather data actually prevailing at the point in time, and the position of the aircraft; and wherein the region of impact of the aircraft on the surface of the Earth indicates a probable region of impact in consideration of the uncertainty of the weather forecast.

2. The device according to claim 1, wherein the computing unit is configured to divide a distance between the aircraft and the surface of the Earth into a plurality of altitude positions and to determine for each altitude position the influence on the aircraft of the weather that is forecast at the point in time of the emergency; and wherein the computing unit is further configured to determine for each altitude position an uncertainty of the determined influence based upon the deviation between the weather forecasts from a preceding receiving step and the prevailing weather data.

3. The device according to claim 2, wherein the computing unit is further configured to accumulate the uncertainties from all the altitude positions and to determine a total uncertainty of the point of impact.

4. The device according to claim 1, wherein the computing unit is configured to determine for different emergency scenarios respectively a region of impact with a point of impact on the surface of the Earth.

5. The device according to claim 1, wherein the computing unit is configured to obtain a north-south component and an east-west component of the air movements and to draw upon the north-south component and the east-west component in the determination of the region of impact.

6. The device according to claim 1, wherein the computing unit is configured to receive weather data from multiple weather information sources and to determine a region of impact based upon the weather data from each weather information source.

7. The device according to claim 1, wherein the computing unit is configured to determine at least one of the following parameters for the deviation between the weather forecasts and the weather data that is actually occurring for the forecast period of time: average value, median, simple standard deviation, a positive and a negative maximum value of the deviation.

8. The device according to claim 1, wherein the computing unit is configured to determine the region of impact in such a manner that the aircraft impacts with a predetermined probability within the region of impact on the surface of the Earth.

9. The device according to claim 1, wherein the computing unit is configured to further draw upon at least one of the following parameters for the procedure for determining the region of impact: a projected surface of the aircraft, a resistance coefficient, and a fall speed.

10. A system for operating an unmanned aircraft, comprising: an unmanned aircraft having a position determining unit; a device according to claim 1; wherein the position determining unit is configured to determine a position of the aircraft in relation to the surface of the Earth and to transmit said position to the device; wherein the device is configured to determine based upon the transmitted position of the unmanned aircraft a region of impact of the unmanned aircraft on the surface of the Earth in the event of an emergency.

Description

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

(1) Exemplary embodiments of the invention are explained in further detail below with the aid of the attached drawings. The illustrations are schematic and not to scale. Identical reference numerals relate to identical or similar elements. In the drawings:

(2) FIG. 1 illustrates schematically wind speeds in various altitude positions.

(3) FIG. 2 illustrates schematically regions of impact of an aircraft in various emergency scenarios.

(4) FIG. 3 illustrates schematically a device in accordance with an exemplary embodiment.

(5) FIG. 4 illustrates schematically cyclically updated weather data and also weather forecasts.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

(6) FIG. 1 illustrates an exemplary weather data diagram 1. The altitude above the surface of the Earth is plotted on the vertical axis 2 and the wind speed is plotted on the horizontal axis 3.

(7) Such a weather data diagram 1 may be generated respectively for air movements in the north-south direction and in the east-west direction. In this case, the wind speed may assume positive or negative values. By way of example, positive values mean a wind movement towards the north or east whereas negative values mean a wind movement towards the south or west.

(8) The altitude may be divided into multiple altitude positions 8 in order to be able to draw upon these altitude positions individually in order to determine the influence on a falling aircraft.

(9) The line 4 that is illustrated as a dashed-dotted line corresponds to the retrieved weather information or the weather forecast for a specific point in time. The dotted line 5 corresponds to the actual weather situation as has been determined for the forecast point in time. The difference between the line 5 and the line 4 corresponds to the deviation 6 between forecast weather and weather that is actually occurring. The deviation 6 is determined as the difference between forecast weather and weather that is actually occurring in a specific altitude position as is illustrated by the two arrows 7 that are pointing to one another.

(10) The deviation 6 may be determined by way of example in that the forecast for the point in time of the next weather measurement is compared to the actual result of the weather measurement that is then performed.

(11) FIG. 2 illustrates in an exemplary manner two regions of impact 15, 17 on the surface of the Earth 10 under specific weather conditions and assuming an aircraft P at the position 12. The first region of impact 15 has been determined using a centre point 14 for a first emergency scenario and the second region of impact 17 has been determined using a centre point 16 for a second emergency scenario.

(12) The diameter of the first region of impact is smaller than the diameter of the second region of impact. This may in particular therefore result in the fact that a higher fall speed of the aircraft is presumed for the first emergency scenario in comparison to the second emergency scenario.

(13) The region of the surface of the Earth 10 that is taken into account may be a map. It is now possible to select the flight route for the operational planning in such a manner that the regions of impact 15, 17 move over the surface of the Earth in dependence upon the movement of the aircraft in such a manner that said regions of impact do not overlap with specific regions of the surface of the Earth. By way of example, the aircraft may be controlled in such a manner that the regions of impact do not overlap with densely populated areas.

(14) FIG. 3 illustrates schematically a device 100 for determining a point of impact of an aircraft 200. The device 100 comprises a first interface 110, a second interface 120 and a third interface 130. Furthermore, the device 100 comprises a computing unit 140 and a data storage device 160.

(15) A wireless connection to an interface 210 of the aircraft 200 may be produced via the first interface 110. It is possible via this connection to transmit data in a bidirectional or unidirectional manner. The aircraft 200 comprises a position determining unit 220. The position determining unit 220 is by way of example a GPS receiver and is embodied so as to determine a position of the aircraft 200. Position data and other data relating to the aircraft may be transmitted via the connection between the interface 210 and the first interface 110. The interface 210 and the interface 110 may be by way of example antennae.

(16) The second interface 120 is used for the purpose of receiving data from a weather information source 300. The second interface 120 may be by way of example a network connection in order to reach the weather information source 300 via an interconnected network (by way of example the internet).

(17) The third interface 130 is used for the purpose of connecting and actuating a display unit 150. The display unit 150 may also be embodied as a part of the device 100. The display unit may be a monitor or a display on which a section of a map, the position of the aircraft and also at least one region of impact is displayed in the event of an instant emergency.

(18) The data storage device 160 is used for the purpose of storing weather data and for performing the later statistical evaluation. The data storage device may be by way of example a hard disk.

(19) The computing unit 140 may be a processor that is embodied so as to perform the steps described herein in order to determine at least one region of impact of an aircraft under the prevailing weather conditions.

(20) FIG. 4 illustrates schematically how weather data and also forecasts are processed in order to determine the region of impact and the uncertainty of the region of impact. These steps are performed by the computing unit 140 in that for this purpose the weather information is used that is received from the weather information source 300 and that is stored in the data storage device 160.

(21) At a first point in time T0, weather data W0 is provided by the weather information source 300. This weather data includes initially information A relating to the prevailing weather and forecasts V1 and V2 relating to the future. Even if in FIG. 4 the forecasts are only illustrated over two future cycles, the forecasts may extend over more than the two future cycles.

(22) At a second point in time T1, weather data W1 is provided by the weather information source 300. As with the weather data W0, the weather data W1 also includes information A′ relating to the prevailing weather and forecasts V1′ and V2′. The information A′ of the weather data W1 relates to the same period of time as the information V1 of the weather data W0.

(23) The accuracy of the forecasts in the weather data W0 may consequently be determined via comparison of A′ and V1.

(24) Reference is to be made to the fact that weather data itself typically illustrates a preceding state of the weather conditions when said weather data is first available and may be a few minutes or even hours old. This means that for the procedure for determining a region of impact of the aircraft on the surface of the Earth an operator then works with a weather forecast if the aircraft crashes immediately after retrieving weather data. For this reason, it is helpful to know the uncertainty of forecasts.

(25) At a third point in time T2, weather data W2 is provided by the weather information source 300. As with the weather data W0 and W1, the weather data W2 also includes information A″ relating to the prevailing weather and forecasts V1″ and V2″. The information A″ of the weather data W2 relates to the same period of time as the information V1′ of the weather data W1 and V2 of the weather data W0.

(26) It is consequently possible via a comparison of A″ and V1′ to determine the accuracy of the forecast in the weather data W2. The comparison of A′ with V1 and A″ with V1′ provides the uncertainty of the short-term weather forecast (respectively one cycle retrospectively) whereas the comparison of A″ with V2 and A′″ with V2′ indicates an uncertainty of the longer-term forecast. It is consequently also possible to determine the uncertainty in dependence upon the age of the most recently available weather data. This uncertainty tends to increase the more time that has passed since the last update of the weather data. The greater the time interval between the most recently available weather data and an emergency of the aircraft, the greater the uncertainty of the region of impact that is determined. The computing unit 140 may take this time interval into account for determining the region of impact, by way of example using an exponentially growing multiplicator in dependence upon the time interval.

(27) Typically, updated weather data is provided in an interval of 6 hours. As long as this weather data is actually provided every 6 hours, it may be sufficient for determining the deviation between A′ and V1, A″ and V1′, etc. However, it may be expedient to also determine the longer-term deviation over more than one future cycle (in other words between A″ and V2, A′″ and V2′) in order to be able to likewise determine a region of impact for the case of missing weather data.

(28) The weather data is stored in the data storage device 160. The deviation between the forecast in the preceding receiving step and the actual weather conditions is determined continuously by means of the processor in an immediately following receiving step. In order to reach a greater statistical significance, this deviation may be determined over multiple days or even weeks.

(29) The deviation that is determined in this manner is the measure of the uncertainty when calculating the point of impact of an aircraft on the surface of the Earth in the case of otherwise known or predetermined conditions (in particular fall speed and resistance coefficient). The uncertainty is used for the purpose of providing a point of impact that may be in itself precisely calculated using a broad range of possible deviations, said point of impact then being illustrated as the region of impact on a map.

(30) In addition, reference is to be made to the fact that “including” or “comprising” do not exclude other elements or steps and “a” or “one” do not exclude a plurality. Moreover, reference is to be made to the fact that features or steps that have been described with reference to one of the above exemplary embodiments may also be used in combination with other features or steps of other exemplary embodiments described above. Reference numerals in the claims are not to be seen as limiting.

(31) While at least one exemplary embodiment of the present invention(s) is disclosed herein, it should be understood that modifications, substitutions and alternatives may be apparent to one of ordinary skill in the art and can be made without departing from the scope of this disclosure. This disclosure is intended to cover any adaptations or variations of the exemplary embodiment(s). In addition, in this disclosure, the terms “comprise” or “comprising” do not exclude other elements or steps, the terms “a” or “one” do not exclude a plural number, and the term “or” means either or both. Furthermore, characteristics or steps which have been described may also be used in combination with other characteristics or steps and in any order unless the disclosure or context suggests otherwise. This disclosure hereby incorporates by reference the complete disclosure of any patent or application from which it claims benefit or priority.

LIST OF REFERENCE NUMERALS

(32) 1 Weather data diagram 2 Altitude 3 Wind speed 4 Retrieved weather information 5 Actual weather situation 6 Deviation 7 Information error 8 Altitude position 10 Region of the surface of the Earth that is taken into account 12 Position of an aircraft 14 Point of impact in scenario 1 15 Region of impact 16 Point of impact in scenario 2 17 Region of impact 100 Device for determining a point of impact of an aircraft 110 First interface 120 Second interface 130 Third interface 140 Computing unit 150 Display unit 160 Data storage device 200 Aircraft 210 Data transmission interface 220 Position determining unit 300 Weather information source