A University of Alaska Fairbanks (UAF)-led team recently completed the first FAA-approved true beyond visual line of sight (BVLOS) domestic flight of a UAS in the United States under the small UAS rule.

A Skyfront Perimeter long range hybrid-electric UAS flew 3.87 miles as it inspected a portion of the Trans-Alaska Pipeline. Operators flew the UAS from the university’s Alaska Center for Unmanned Aircraft Systems Integration. 

Instead of using human observers, the UAF team used onboard and ground-based detection systems during the flight to detect and avoid other aircraft in the airspace. One of the systems used was Iris Automation’s Casia, which is an onboard collision avoidance technology. The team also used a five-nautical-mile system made up of eight ground-based Echodyne radars that provided aviation radar coverage along the flight path.

“These first flights demonstrated that new technology can provide a route toward safe beyond-visual-line-of-sight operation of unmanned aircraft in Alaska,” says Cathy Cahill, director of ACUASI, which is part of the UAF Geophysical Institute.

“We want to ensure the safety of manned aviation while opening new opportunities for unmanned aircraft cargo deliveries to villages, monitoring of infrastructure, mammal surveys and a host of other missions of use to Alaskans.”

The flights were conducted under the UAS Integration Pilot Program (IPP), which UAF is participating in. Some of UAF’s goals during the program include enabling routine monitoring flights of both the trans-Alaska oil pipeline and Hilcorp Alaska’s Swanson River Oil Pipeline, delivering medical supplies to remote areas, and enabling BLOS operations across Alaska 24 hours a day, all year long.

“The Integration Pilot Program is helping us advance the safe, secure and reliable integration of drones into the national airspace,” says FAA Acting Administrator Daniel K. Elwell. “This important milestone in Alaska gets us closer to that goal.”