UAS Deployed Live Training: Perception or Reality?

The United States Army is revolutionizing the way it conducts deployed live training by designing in the Live training capabilities on the air vehicles upfront, vice engineering an appended training system after the vehicle is produced. Deployed embedded live training is a design challenge, which is driving the developers to capitalize on the concept of "dual use" hardware for both operations and training. The design challenge is even more evident on the size, weight and power constrained aircraft, such as the Unmanned Aerial Systems (UAS). By utilizing the operational assets, such as the tactical network, radios, sensors and processors, the Soldier can be ready for a live training exercise with the UAS within minutes of arriving at a deployed location. The paper explores system engineering approaches to addressing interoperability challenges. It also investigates the notion of utilizing embedded platform assets to provide exercise management and control, data collection, and constructive wraparound simulation - functionality typically provided by the live training range infrastructure.