The primary goal of UAS regulations is the assurance of safe operations. This goal is quantified by most national aviation agencies as an “Equivalent Level of Safety”, or ELOS, with that of manned aviation.
Since many UAS are based on military or general aviation aircraft, the increased risk stems from the separation of the pilot from the cockpit and the level of automation introduced, rather than the design and construction of the airframe of the UA itself. On the other hand it need be noted that manned aviation has also benefited from increased automation. A considerable percentage of modern commercial aviation operations – including landing – takes place autonomously with the pilots responsible only for monitoring the computers [10].
This Chapter specifies what the ELOS requirement entails for UAS regulations. To accomplish this, the safety performance of manned aviation need first be evaluated. Next a novel model is presented to derive reliability requirements for achieving TLS for ground impact and mid-air collision accidents.
The provided definitions for the terms hazard and accident given in Chap. 1; the first as the necessary conditions that may lead to the second and the latter as an unwanted outcome with associated damages. As a result, the expected rate of occurrence of an accident can be calculated from the expected rate of hazards. Equivalently, given an accident rate limit, a UAS can be designed so that its components have sufficient reliability to ensure that set limit is not violated.
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(2009). UAS Safety Assessment and Functional Requirements. In: Dalamagkidis, K., Valavanis, K.P., Piegl, L.A. (eds) On Integrating Unmanned Aircraft Systems into the National Airspace System. Intelligent Systems, Control and Automation: Science and Engineering, vol 36. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4020-8672-4_5
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