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Meeting	ACGS Committee Meeting 127 - San Diego, CA - November 2021
Agenda Location	8 SUBCOMMITTEE D – DYNAMICS, COMPUTATIONS, AND ANALYSIS 8.2 GA-ASI Automatic Takeoff and Landing Systems Overview
Title	GA-ASI Automatic Takeoff and Landing Systems Overview
Presenter	Leon Alvarez
Affiliation	General Atomics Aeronautical Systems Inc.
Available Downloads*	presentation
	Downloads are available to members who are logged in and either Active* or attended this meeting.
Abstract	The General Atomics Aeronautical Systems Inc. (GA-ASI) Automatic Takeoff and Landing Systems (ATLS) have been in development and in a continual improvement cycle since the early 2000’s. However the system was not deployed until 2009 by the US Army, whose Gray Eagle UAS was the first customer platform to be specified without stick, rudder and throttle controls. This eliminated active pilot control in the ground control station in favor of ATLS. Typical Predator UAS missions involve launch and recovery operations by a remote pilot over line of sight data links with handoff to remote operators for extended operations over satellite controls. In recent years, there has been a push to automate the mission execution to be conducted completely over satellite control, which has the benefit of making forward operations more cost effective in terms of reduced equipment and manning requirements. This trend places more importance on the ATLS systems and underlying flight and ground control laws to operate in a robust manner across myriad payload/weapons configurations, wide weight ranges and specified weather envelopes. This presentation shall provide an overview of the GA-ASI autolanding system historical development, general design requirements and challenges as well as future enhancement areas currently being pursued.