Risk Areas Determination for Autonomous- and Semi-autonomous Aerial Systems Considering Run-Time Technical Reliability Assessment

• Published in: Journal of intelligent & robotic systems Vol. 97; no. 3-4; pp. 511 - 529
• Main Authors: Hägele Georg, Söffker Dirk
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Dordrecht Springer Nature B.V 01-03-2020
• Subjects: Domains; Intranets; Reliability analysis; Risk management; Safety
• ISSN: 0921-0296; 1573-0409
• DOI: 10.1007/s10846-019-01056-4

Autonomous or semi-autonomous aerial systems are used in different application domains to simplify or assist humans tasks. In this context, their behavior has to be verifiably safe. Here safe behavior denotes system’s interaction with the environment with freedom from unacceptable risk for the environment and the system itself. Traditionally, run-time technical reliability assessment is not considered for risk areas determination. Run-time definition and online control of risk areas based on current technical reliability may be used as a function to assure safe behavior of autonomous or semi-autonomous aerial systems. This contribution introduces a novel technique for the definition and control of risk areas considering system’s behavior as well as it’s technical reliability during run-time. The technique is used to separate the space around an autonomous aerial system into risk-related areas. On this basis, the safety unit can realize emergency actions to ensure system’s safe behavior if necessary. The introduction of the novel technique is realized in the context of the safety unit description and run-time technical reliability assessment. For the run-time technical reliability assessment, a novel technique is introduced, inspired by the functional safety standard IEC 61508. Simulation results demonstrate the successful use of the introduced approach.