Integration activities of the BORDERUAS project to support the 1st Pilot in Croatia

In the months leading up to the inaugural field-trial (Croatia) for the BorderUAS Project, Technical Partners, Under the aegis of WP5 (“Solution Integration”) led by ADDITESS, have commenced a series of weekly virtual encounters baring the title “Remote Integration Test Sessions”. The scope of those, technical in nature, online gatherings would be to test payload components, the C2 system, the Mission planning modules and the analytics mechanisms in a remote fashion, to decide on the level of readiness of equipment/services in view of the upcoming field-trial. In particular, the scheduling of online Sessions involves both multilateral meetings as well as bilateral ones and were tailored to accommodate the needs of the Technical Partners’ weekly schedules and any issues arising from the software and hardware testing thereof.

In a nutshell, each individual Session is dedicated to the testing of software and hardware components partaking to the “Ground” (Command & Controls functions) and “Airborne” Segments (payload functions) of BorderUAS’ dedicated equipment. At the time of writing, the Remote Integration Test Sessions have managed to yield the following technical updates, as listed below:

Secure Network Setup

The Remote Integration Test Sessions have initially managed to establish secure internet access to BorderUAS’ Network. The established VPN connection, by means of firewall routing, enables secure connectivity to BorderUAS’ Ground segment hosting the Command & Control (C2) software for receiving the payload real-time and analytics mechanisms feeds and for, as well as the Airborne Segment where the attached onboard PC and sensors payloads, complemented by a secondary router, will enable for control over the payload’s sensors and cameras.

C2’s map overlaying properties

Through consecutive Test Sessions, the Consortium’s Technical Partners have recorded progress on attempting to project overlaying visualizations in the GIS map instances set to feature on C2’s software. In doing so, the information segments from the payload components can be pieced together to provide a more comprehensive display of an unfolding scenario event, by complementing the GIS map projection with different data layers, such as acoustic images etc.

Event alert(s) progress

Technical Partners have succeeded in projecting a multitude of alert triggering events on their developed software tool’s HMI layout (C2) along with the corresponding payload feed in a readable data format (i.e. acoustic files, photo instances etc.). Additionally, the C2’s HMI layout also projected territorial instances in the section dedicated to GIS map projection. Area visualization served as the basis for the designation of restricted territories and the several points of interest where the displayed triggering events are located in.  

Payload feed & real-time streaming progress

In the aftermath of several Technical Sessions, the Technical Partners managed to record progress on getting the C2 software to display a simultaneous range of feed from three (3) separate cameras (multicast). Having secured a steady line of feed, Technical Partners continue to work on algorithmic designs that aim to facilitate analysis of the former during and after an event has occurred (i.e. re-identification of individuals etc.). Moreover, Integration Sessions also seek to secure a steady real-time video-stream for display on the HMI C2 Software’s layout. Thus far, Technical Partners have occasionally achieved the projection of simultaneous real-time video-streaming from payload components. The ultimate scope of payload feed & real-time streaming is to establish a steady flow of raw data from the multitude of payload sensors as well as the corresponding real-time analysis feedback, transformed and provided through a human readable event annotation format (i.e. VCD files etc.).