A Tactical Conflict Resolution Method for UAVs in Geovectored Airspace

In order to enable the safe and efficient integration of Unmanned Aerial Vehicles into very low level airspace, current day research focuses on the development of new traffic services and procedures. One of these is the geovectoring protocol, which aims to reduce traffic complexity by setting limits on the allowed ground speed, course, and vertical speed. A geovector can be used to increase the capacity of an airspace by lowering the conflict rate. However, problems emerge when performing avoidance maneuvers in geovectored airspace, as the limits are ignored in this process. A powerful conflict resolution algorithm is the Modified Voltage Potential (MVP). This paper proposes an extension to the MVP algorithm, based on Velocity Obstacle theory. Making use of an alternative horizontal conflict resolution maneuver which respects the geovector, five resolution strategies are defined with different priority settings for the separate limits. The performance of these strategies is compared to pure MVP on geovector, safety, and stability measures, making use of fast-time simulations in a corridor airspace. All geovector resolution strategies show improvements on the ability to perform conflict resolution maneuvers within the geovector limits, while having marginal effects on the overall airspace safety level. It is recommended to further investigate the performance of the geovector resolution strategies for other types of airspace, to verify whether the observed reduction in conflict rate from the geovectors can be reinforced by the resolution strategies.