Formation flight path coordination of unmanned aerial vehicles

Abstract

A method for implementation of a formation flight path coordination for a scalable group of Unmanned Arial Vehicles (UAVs) including a recursive architecture with a leader UAV and a plurality of follower UAVs in communication with the leader UAV, the method comprising the steps of: receiving formation commands for the UAVs of the group from a ground controller station (GCS), the formation commands including positional and velocity information for implementation by onboard processing systems, the formation commands received on a first communication channel established between the leader UAV and the GCS; sending information from the formation commands by the leader UAV to the plurality of follower UAVs belonging to the leader UAV using a second communication channel established between the plurality of follower UAVs and the leader UAV, the second communication channel separate from the first communication channel; receiving updated formation commands for the flight path from the GCS on the first communication channel; and sending information from the updated formation commands by the leader UAV to the plurality of follower UAVs using the second communication channel. Safety features such as collision avoidance and geofencing, as well as GCS configuration are also presented.