A path planning system for Autonomous Launch and Recovery System of Autonomous Underwater Vehicles

In this paper, a path planning system for mobile Autonomous Launch And Recovery System (AutoLARS) is presented. The unique AutoLARS is capable of tracking an AUV eqipped with a commercial off the shelf transponder. Path planning system uses the information of position and commands the AutoLARS control system with motion set points. The real time tracking of the AUV is used to build approximate trajectory or intercept strategy directly. The path planning system uses a graph building method for filtering the tracking data of AUV and Finite State Machine (FSM) to compute motion set points for control system. The path planning incorporates motion that allows the AutoLARS to align with the AUV and intercept it. The AutoLARS does not require to be equipped with velocity sensors or high grade navigation sensors and assumes that AUV is coming at a nominal heading between two way points at a known depth.