About *

The project

Recently, there has been growing interest in developing Hybrid Autonomous Unmanned Vehicles (HAUVs) capable of air-water
trans-media continuous and uninterrupted motion and performing.

The main idea for the proposed project is to develop a new design combining the well-known UAV’s and UUV’s Technologies into a combined technology for a Hybrid Unmanned Vehicle, which can fly, hover in the air and sail, hover under the water and which has the ability to repeat
air-water trans-media motions.
The HAUV will be able to be launched and recovered from platforms/units operated, and controlled by land, sea (surface/underwater) and air. The project includes the design of a high-level control, command, communication, and intelligence (C3I) system. The carrier vessel/unit can also be embedded with point-to-multipoint networking through the HAUV, meaning after it releases the HAUV, the system can communicate and relay with friendly forces operating nearby.

The drone will be designed to return to the operator or to an indicated/predetermined position manually/autonomously/combined using an advanced mission planning subsystem. The fact it is released from underwater means it could not be expendable but returnable to the underwater mother carrier.

The concept of the PASITHEA application and the derived relevant technologies have not been combinedly applied in the European defence sector previously. The PASITHEA concept has the potential not only to significantly alter the way that defences forces operate, but also potential scalability in other domains.

The project aims to give a strategic advantage, enhancing military multidiscipline operations. In this respect, different application scenarios / concepts can be envisaged. However, technical challenges where research is needed to develop the envisaged system must be faced.

The successful use of unmanned vehicles in recent operations has led to recognition of their broader utility and to additional calls for more unmanned vehicles.

Expected Impact

The use of Unmanned Vehicles in military operations represents one of the most important innovations of recent years. Undoubtedly UxVs exploitation will grow in the coming years with the massive introduction of other autonomous systems in different domains (land, air, sea) and the increase of capabilities to work collaboratively between systems (swarms) and people. The use of such UxV systems has a direct impact in reducing the exposure of human operators and soldiers to associated risks. Such systems can also improve the efficiency and performance of the operative to provide tactical superiority and provide robust and reliable solutions in very demanding conditions. The “PASITHEA” project aims at generating novel knowledge by studying well known UAV’s and UUV’s Technologies beyond the current state of the art, ultimately combining them to design a Hybrid Unmanned Vehicle, which can fly, hover in the air and sail under the water and which has the ability to repeat air water trans-media motions. The HAUV (Hybrid Autonomous Unmanned Vehicle) will be able to be launched, operated and controlled by land, sea or air platforms/units providing a high-level control, command, communication, and intelligence (C3I) system.

* Funded by the European Union under Grant Agreement No. 101121412. Views and opinions expressed are however those of the author(s) only and do not necessarily reflect those of the European Union nor the European Commission. Neither the European Union nor the granting authority can be held responsible for them.