Development Life Cycle for Using a DNN to Complete the Autonomous Aerial Refueling Task

The future of aviation is unmanned and ultimately autonomous. As part of this effort the Office of Naval Research, in partnership with the Naval Air Systems Command, has initiated the advanced autonomous air-to-air refueling system (A4RS) future naval capability (FNC). The A4RS FNC intends to set the interface requirements for any uncrewed aerial system to receive fuel from a United States Navy (USN) aircraft. Additionally, the A4RS FNC will be the first time that a system will be authorized to complete autonomous behavior without a human in or on the loop. However, a method to certify this behavior safe for flight does not currently exist. This paper details the method that has been proposed as part of the FNC to the naval flight certification authorities for approving a deep neural network to complete the aerial refueling task.