Launching Systems for Unmanned Vehicles Onboard Naval Vessels

Unmanned vehicles can replace humans in humanitarian and military operations, requiring ships to have innovative capabilities for launching and recovering them. However, the variety of unmanned vehicles makes it difficult to create standardized interfaces, and their development often outpaces the lifespan of ships. Integrating unmanned vehicles on naval vessels is complex due to technical requirements and limited space. Engineers must consider cost efficiency, flexibility, and operational impact. This paper presents technologies and solutions for launching unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) from front-line ships, with their pros and cons. To this end, Fuzzy Analytic Hierarchy Process (F AHP) has been here employed to rank the main options. Among them, the electromagnetic catapult is the most promising option for launching UAVs from front-line naval ships and it is worthy of further development. Besides, despite having limited capacity, bungee cords can be used until the technology of the electromagnetic catapult is tested and ready to take the place of the former.