Singular Perturbation based Aircraft Trajectory Optimization for Threat Avoidance

Earlier work developed methods of time-controlled optimal flight-trajectory generation that included the effects of risk from a threat environment. Singular perturbation (SP) theory was used to obtain a reduced order airplane model of the transport class and then Pontryagin´s Minimum Principle was used with a Fibonacci search method to minimize a cost functional that consisted of a weighted linear combination of risk, fuel-flow, time, and position constraints. This paper presents further research results on the horizontal plane trajectory optimization algorithm and introduces a new surface-to-air threat effectiveness model.