Aircraft ground collision avoidance system

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-10964221-B2
Application number	US-201816124468-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Sep 7, 2018
Priority date	Sep 7, 2017
Publication date	Mar 30, 2021
Grant date	Mar 30, 2021

Abstract

An improved ground collision avoidance system and method is provided for aircraft driven during ground operations by electric taxi drive systems. One or more monitoring devices employing scanning LiDAR technology may be mounted in exterior locations on or near aircraft landing gears or aerodynamically in locations on the aircraft fuselage selected to generate panoramic three-dimensional images from any point of view within or without the aircraft as the aircraft is driven independently within an airport ramp area. The point of view images are transmitted in real time to displays in the aircraft cockpit and may be transmitted to displays outside and remote from the aircraft, allowing the pilot and airport personnel to monitor the aircraft moving within the ramp environment and to respond quickly to control the aircraft's electric taxi drive system-powered ground travel to avoid and prevent a potential collision.

First claim

The invention claimed is:

1. An improved aircraft ground travel collision avoidance system for electric taxi drive system-driven aircraft maneuvering within an airport ramp area that increases safety of aircraft ground maneuvers and ramp area ground operations, comprising:
a. an aircraft equipped with wing-mounted engines operable for flight and with nose or main landing gear wheel-mounted electric taxi drive systems operable to drive the aircraft during ground travel without operation of said engines, the electric taxi drive systems being controllable by a pilot with controls in a cockpit of the aircraft to drive the aircraft during ground maneuvers within an airport ramp area;
b. one or more monitoring devices aerodynamically mounted in one or more exterior locations on the aircraft positioned to monitor an environmental space surrounding the aircraft from a ramp ground surface to a height of the aircraft wing not visible to the pilot from the cockpit, the one or more monitoring devices comprising scanning LiDAR devices operable to obtain a real time 360 degree panoramic field of view of the monitored environmental space from a selected point of view during the aircraft ground maneuvers in the airport ramp area; and
c. a processor onboard the aircraft and software configured and operable to receive real time information from the one or more monitoring devices relating to the real time 360 degree panoramic field of view of the monitored environmental space, to generate a real time visual representation of the panoramic field of view of the monitored environmental space from the selected point of view, and to transmit the generated real time visual representation of the monitored environmental space to a display in the cockpit of the aircraft viewable by the pilot in real time as the pilot controls the electric taxi drive system to maneuver the aircraft during ground travel within said airport ramp area.

2. The system of claim 1 , wherein the selected point of view of said monitored environmental space comprises a point of view from inside the aircraft or a point of view from outside the aircraft.

3. The system of claim 1 , wherein one of said one or more monitoring devices comprises a scanning LiDAR device having an aerodynamic profile aerodynamically mounted on a ground-facing surface of a fuselage of the aircraft.

4. The system of claim 3 , wherein said scanning LiDAR device is aerodynamically mounted on said fuselage ground-facing surface aft of a nose landing gear or aft of main landing gears of said aircraft.

5. The system of claim 3 , wherein said scanning LiDAR device is aerodynamically mounted on said fuselage ground-facing surface under a tailskid on said aircraft.

6. The system of claim 1 , further comprising an automatically or manually activatable collision avoidance kill switch element in communication with said electric taxi drive systems and said processor.

7. The system of claim 1 , further comprising a number of shareable limited access display screens in locations onboard and offboard said aircraft in communication with the processor and operable to receive and share with the pilot and authorized users said transmitted visual representation of the monitored environmental space in real time as said pilot maneuvers said aircraft.

8. The system of claim 1 , wherein said one or more exterior locations of said one or more monitoring devices comprise on a nose landing gear door or a main landing gear door interior or exterior surface, and on a ground-facing surface of portions of a fuselage of said aircraft not visible to said pilot from said cockpit.

9. The system of claim 8 , wherein said one or more exterior locations comprise on the exterior surface of one or more nose or main landing gear doors, and the one or more scanning LiDAR devices are operable to obtain said 360 degree panoramic three dimensional field of view in real time when said landing gear doors are open and said landing gears are extended.

10. The system of claim 8 , wherein said one or more monitoring devices are aerodynamically mounted on said ground-facing surface of the portions of said fuselage to be extendible from said surface of said fuselage to obtain said real time 360 degree panoramic field of view during monitoring and retractable within said fuselage to form an aerodynamic surface on said fuselage when said aircraft is in flight.

11. The system of claim 10 , wherein said one or more monitoring devices comprise pop out elements or pop down elements that maintain the aerodynamic surface.

12. The system of claim 1 , further comprising multiple ones of said one or more monitoring devices aerodynamically mounted in multiple exterior locations on said aircraft to provide multiple real time 360 degree panoramic fields of view of the monitored environmental space from said selected point of view.

13. The system of claim 1 , wherein the one or more scanning LiDAR devices are adapted for aircraft use to have a size that adds a minimal amount of weight to the aircraft and are aerodynamically mounted in one or more exterior locations to be out of a slipstream of the aircraft when the aircraft is in flight.

14. A method that increases ground travel safety of aircraft driven by electric taxi drive systems to maneuver and avoid collisions within an airport ramp area and improves safety of airport ground operations, comprising:
a. providing an aircraft equipped with wing-mounted engines operable for flight and with nose or main landing gear wheel-mounted electric taxi drive systems controllable by a pilot in a cockpit of the aircraft to drive the aircraft without operation of the engines during ground maneuvers in an airport ramp area, providing one or more scanning LiDAR devices aerodynamically mounted in exterior aircraft locations operable with controls in the cockpit to monitor an environmental space surrounding the aircraft extending from a ramp ground surface to a height of wings of the aircraft not visible to the pilot from the aircraft cockpit, and providing a processor onboard the aircraft to receive and process real time information from the one or more scanning LiDAR devices and transmit the real time information to a display in the aircraft cockpit;
b. aerodynamically mounting one or multiple ones of the one or more scanning LiDAR devices in one or more locations on or in a ground-facing surface of a fuselage of the aircraft selected to monitor the environmental space surrounding the aircraft from ramp ground surface to the height of the wings not visible to the pilot and to obtain a 360 degree panoramic field of view of the environmental space surrounding the aircraft from the ramp ground surface to the height of the wings from a selected point of view onboard or offboard the aircraft;
c. controlling the electric taxi drive systems and maneuvering the aircraft with the electric taxi drive systems during ground travel within the ramp area, selecting a point of view of the environmental space surrounding the aircraft operating the one or more scanning LiDAR devices to monitor the environmental space, and obtaining the 360 degree panoramic field of view of the environmental space from the selected point of view in real time as the pilot is maneuvering the aircraft with the electric taxi drive systems;
d. transmitting the obtained 360 degree panoramic field of view information of the monitored environmental space from the selected point of view to the processor in real time, processing the obtained 360 degree panoramic field of view information, and transmitting the processed real time 360 degree panoramic field of view information to the cockpit display in the form

Assignees

• Borealis Tech Ltd

Inventors

• Vana Jan
• Cox Joseph J
• Cox Isaiah W

Classifications

• G08G5/80

  Anti-collision systems · CPC title

• G08G5/56

  for two or more aircraft · CPC title

• G08G5/26

  Transmission of traffic-related information between aircraft and ground stations · CPC title

• G05D1/0033

  by having the operator tracking the vehicle either by direct line of sight or via one or more cameras located remotely from the vehicle · CPC title

• G05D1/0027

  involving a plurality of vehicles, e.g. fleet or convoy travelling (fleet control of land vehicles from a control room G05D1/0297; traffic control systems for road vehicles G08G1/00; for marine craft G08G3/00; for aircraft G08G5/00) · CPC title