Evolving the Design of a Volcanic Monitoring UAS over Several Flight Campaigns

A multi-organization effort has been underway for several years to develop and validate the use of small unmanned aircraft systems (UAS) for volcanic monitoring. The overall goal is to develop the aircraft, supporting systems, concept of operations, scientific payloads and regulatory framework to allow regular and reliable sampling in challenging and dynamic atmospheric conditions around volcanic summits. Central to this effort has been the development and refinement of the “S2” aircraft, which contains a tightly integrated system consisting of the airframe, avionics, and payload sensors specifically designed to measure atmospheric properties around volcanic plumes. The aircraft has a 3-meter wingspan and can carry a 2.3 kg payload for up to 100 km while operating at altitudes up to 6,000 m.

To date, the system has been flown in Costa Rica to sample CO2 gases around Turrialba Volcano (Costa Rica), in Hawaii to assess the 2018 eruption of Kīlauea with several different sensors, and is currently planned for deployment in Alaska for gas sampling and photogrammetry at Makushin Volcano. Before and after each deployment, all aspects of the system and concept of operations (CONOPS) were extensively examined and modified to improve the safety and performance. This has culminated in the upcoming deployment which will fly up to 30 km - beyond visual line of sight for the first time. This expansion of the operational range through additional safety features and redundancy will pave the way for monitoring and accessing areas that were previously very difficult to reach from both a technical and regulatory perspective. These developments can be extended to a variety of missions requiring UAS for atmospheric sampling, specifically ones that would benefit from beyond visual line of sight operations or flights into harsh or difficult atmospheric environments.