A Risk-Aware Mission Planning and Monitoring Methodology for UAS Operations

The increasing use of Unmanned Aircraft Systems (UAS) in critical scenarios raises the need for efficient mission planning and risk assessment methodologies. One of the main challenges in UAS operations is the regulatory approval process, which requires operators to prepare comprehensive and compliant documentation. In this paper, we propose a mission planning methodology designed to assist UAS operators in conducting a risk assessment aligned with SORA 2.5 and generating documentation that meets European regulatory requirements. Additionally, our methodology integrates a risk-aware path planning approach to compute low-risk flight routes. Another key aspect of our approach is a situational awareness module, which enables real-time monitoring of risk and operational constraints during mission execution. If the initially planned route becomes unsafe, a re-planning algorithm dynamically adjusts the route, ensuring an adequate level of safety. Although the proposed methodology is still under development, this paper presents the essential requirements and features, as well as preliminary results on risk map generation and risk-based route planning and re-planning algorithms.