Multicopter-assisted system and method for launching and retrieving a fixed-wing aircraft
AssigneeHood Technology Corporation
InventorsAndreas H. von Flotow, Corydon C. Roeseler, Caleb Andrew Woodruff, Daniel Pepin Reiss
Life of this patent
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Abstract
The present disclosure provides various embodiments of a multicopter-assisted launch and retrieval system generally including: (1) a multi-rotor modular multicopter attachable to (and detachable from) a fixed-wing aircraft to facilitate launch of the fixed-wing aircraft into wing-borne flight; (2) a storage and launch system usable to store the modular multicopter and to facilitate launch of the fixed-wing aircraft into wing-borne flight; and (3) an anchor system usable (along with the multicopter and a flexible capture member) to retrieve the fixed-wing aircraft from wing-borne flight.
Claims18
A method for retrieving a fixed-wing aircraft from wing-borne flight, the method comprising:
- flying a rotorcraft above an anchor system such that a part of a flexible capture member connected at one end to the rotorcraft, at another end to a flexible capture member payout and retract device of the anchor system, and to a breakaway device of the anchor system extends between the rotorcraft and the anchor system;
- station-keeping the rotorcraft relative to the anchor system;
- and
- contacting and capturing the part of the flexible capture member extending between the rotorcraft and the anchor system with the fixed-wing aircraft, which causes the breakaway device to release the flexible capture member when a designated tension in the flexible capture member is exceeded and, thereafter, causes the flexible capture member payout and retract device to pay out another part of the flexible capture member and impose a resistive force opposing movement of the fixed-wing aircraft.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.