KIL: Kinetic Integrity Layer — A Behavioural Veto Architecture for Drone Safety Middleware in Defence-Adjacent Agricultural Airspace

This paper introduces the Kinetic Integrity Layer (KIL), a behavioural veto architecture comprising an 8-gate sequential decision engine for autonomous drone safety in defence-adjacent agricultural airspace. KIL is grounded in linear algebra-driven confidence scoring, geofence enforcement, thermal sensor integrity validation, and dual-market confidence threshold standards calibrated separately for agricultural (τ=0.72) and defence (τ=0.94) operational contexts. The architecture enforces a mandatory human-in-the-loop checkpoint at Gate 6. Total pipeline latency averages 22.2ms across all eight gates, within real-time autonomous drone operation requirements. KIL is the safety spine of a three-part autonomous agricultural AI stack, governing the SAR-BioVolume sensing pipeline and Green Core Intelligence Layer. This working paper presents initial theoretical and simulation-based findings. Physical deployment validation is planned as the next research stage.