Date of Award

3-22-2012

Document Type

Thesis

Degree Name

Master of Science

Department

Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering

First Advisor

Meir Pachter, PhD.

Abstract

Inertial Navigation System (INS) aiding using bearing measurements taken over time of stationary ground features is investigated. A cross country flight, in two and three dimensional space, is considered, as well as a vertical drop in three dimensional space. The objective is to quantify the temporal development of the uncertainty in the navigation states of an aircraft INS which is aided by taking bearing measurements of ground objects which have been geolocated using ownship position. It is shown that during wings level flight at constant speed and a fixed altitude, an aircraft that tracks ground objects and over time sequentially transitions to tracking new ground objects which were geolocated by the aircraft as they came into view, will have the beneficial effect of considerably reducing the long term uncertainty in the INS-provided navigation state. It is also shown that a munition in free fall tracking previously geolocated ground features will also have the beneficial effect of reducing the uncertainty in the INS-provided navigation state.

AFIT Designator

AFIT-GE-ENG-12-36

DTIC Accession Number

ADA557544

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