The Control of Aircraft in Terrain-Following and Formation-Flight Applications

This paper is devoted to the mathematical and philosophical development of control laws which form the foundation of a new approach to the control of aircraft in terrain-following and formation-flight modes of operation. The somewhat similar problems of terrain-following and formation flight are attacked thru the solution of the well known Euler-Poisson equation for an applicable definition of an optimal integral error criterion. The approach is compared to past and present methods of control law formulation to perform the tasks of terre. in-following and formation-flight.