A Novel Solution for Overflight and Surveying of a Collaborative Target with Fixed Wing UAV

This study presents a new guidance law for a fixed-wing Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) with surveillance and/or tracking purposes. In particular the algorithm ensures a continue overflying of the target whether it is fixed or when it moves. Particular attention is paid to the definition of the guidance specifications in order to derive a suitable guidance law capable to fulfill the requirements under tight constrains like the constancy of airspeed and bounded lateral accelerations. Stability proof of the proposed guidance law, together with parameter definition criteria have been developed. An assessment of the performances of the presented law is given by means of software simulations and hardware-in-the-loop tests.