Mission

The goal of Project Merlin is to design, develop, and build an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) that has a wide flight envelope and is also very cost effective. The intent is to design an aircraft that can fly at both high speed and low speed which will help it become one of the first fast response UAVs. Having the vehicle available for low cost relative to current UAVs will also make this design more affordable and accessible to organizations with smaller budgets than the military. The group that this particular design scenario was prepared for was for law enforcement agencies. The mission of Aesalon, the name of the airplane designed by Project Merlin, is to offer police departments across this country a safer and more cost effective alternative to helicopters in order to satisfy their high speed chase and reconnaissance needs.

The Aesalon will be able to take-off and get to a trouble area quickly. It will then have the ability to slow down and perform its duty, if necessary. Then it will be able to return to its home airport to refuel and prepare for the next mission. All of this will be able to be accomplished with the minimal interaction of a human operator.

Typical Mission Scenario

Aesalon will receive messages from a law enforcement agency. An officer in the field will have to request the use of Aesalon from headquarters. If the access is granted, a message will be sent to Aesalon which will be waiting for orders from a local airport. The officer could be in pursuit of a stolen vehicle or a fleeing bank robber. Aesalon will be given high priority to take-off at the airport and within five minutes will be able to taxi out of its hanger and be airborne. Aesalon will then lock on to the GPS coordinates of the pursuing officer’s car and determine the fastest flight path to reach the chase. Aesalon will then be able to reach top speed, approximately 200 mph, and rush to the ensuing chase.

Once on site, Aesalon will be able to perform one of three tasks. First, it could stay at altitude and simply maintain visual contact with the chase to provide video surveillance of the situation. This video could then be fed to the cars on the ground to help them in the pursuit. Second, Aesalon will have the ability to fly close to the vehicle and fire a small GPS tracking device that will continue to monitor the vehicles position. This position would be able to be sent to ground units, helicopters, or other UAV’s in order to maintain constant contact with the vehicle. Third, Aesalon will have a payload mounted in the bottom of the aircraft that will be able to disable the speeding car. Aesalon will position itself above the vehicle on the ground, just like if it were going to fire the GPS tracking device, and then it will fire an electromagnetic device into the skin of the vehicle. This will be attached to a high voltage power supply in the aircraft that will transmit the electricity to the vehicle by a wire, which will disable it. Once the vehicle is disabled or Aesalon is no longer needed, it will return to its home airport where it will refuel and prepare for its next mission.

As mentioned above, Aesalon will have the ability to follow and disable a moving vehicle. This will be done by one of two ways. When the aircraft first arrives on the scene, it will be following the GPS signal of the pursuing officer’s vehicle. A ground operator will then have to guide Aesalon to the vehicle that is being pursued. This will be done by selecting the vehicle on a computer screen. The pursuing officer or another operator will have to select the vehicle and then Aesalon will begin to autonomously track the vehicle based on the heat signature that it picks up from the engine of the vehicle. Once locked on, the aircraft will not need any further guidance information from a human, only to command it to maintain surveillance, attach a GPS tracking device, or to disable the vehicle. At any time during a mission, a ground controller will have the ability to take over flight of the aircraft if the need arose.

Typical Aesalon mission profile

A second mission that Aesalon could also handle would be surveillance of a foot chase. The mission would begin and end as in the vehicle chase scenario. An operator on the ground would issue the command to take-off and Aesalon would then travel to the scene of the chase. This time the sensors on board would be used to track a person fleeing on foot. After picking out the suspect’s heat signature on a computer screen, Aesalon would then be able to track the fugitive. Using its low speed capability and high maneuverability, Aesalon will be able to circle in a tight configuration over the chase.

Both of these scenarios could happen in either an urban or rural setting. A low cost and fast UAV might be even more attractive to state level or rural law enforcement agencies. These agencies have very large areas to cover so a high speed vehicle will allow them provide a quick response to any situation within their jurisdiction. Also, a low cost vehicle will allow rural municipalities to purchase a vehicle to give them an eye in the sky even if they have a smaller budget than a large city. Aesalon will bring the safety of an aerial law enforcement vehicle to any area of this country.