JP2023117217A - Flying object management system - Google Patents

Abstract

To provide a flying object management system which manages multiple flying objects on surveillance flight in consideration of a range of an abnormal event that changes with time.SOLUTION: A flying object management system is provided, comprising: a flight information management unit 6 configured to manage flight information including chronological positions of flying objects 3; a surveillance data acquisition unit 54 configured to acquire facility surveillance data generated by surveillance devices 33 mounted on the flying objects 3; an abnormal event determination unit 55 configured to determine occurrence of an abnormal event at or around a facility; a temporal behavior estimation unit 58 configured to estimate temporal behavior of the determined abnormal event; and a special flight route generation unit 70 configured to generate a special flight route for each of the flying objects 3 in the event of an abnormal situation on the basis of the temporal behavior estimated by the temporal behavior estimation unit 58 and the flight information.SELECTED DRAWING: Figure 5

Description

The present invention relates to an aircraft management system that manages a plurality of aircraft that monitor facilities.

In order to maintain the soundness of infrastructure facilities such as gas production plants and power generation plants, it is essential to monitor various equipment provided in these facilities. In recent years, attempts have been made to use unmanned mobile vehicles and unmanned flying objects when inspecting large-scale facilities such as infrastructure facilities.

Patent Literature 1 proposes an unmanned air vehicle that inspects equipment provided in a surveillance area and monitors the surveillance area, and a flight control method for the same. This flight control method includes steps of flying an unmanned flying object according to a preset flight route for inspecting equipment, detecting a leak target leaking from the equipment with a sensor provided on the unmanned flying object, a step of determining a dangerous area where the flight of the unmanned flying object is dangerous when it is determined that the unmanned air vehicle has leaked; a step of setting a new flight route that avoids the determined dangerous area; Steps for making the aircraft fly are performed.

Patent Literature 2 discloses an information processing system including a flying object (disaster prevention drone) and a server device. The flying object includes a transmission unit that acquires disaster prevention information indicating the occurrence of an event that causes a disaster and the disaster-affected area and transmits it to the server device, a control unit that performs flight control, and the acquired disaster prevention information. and a reporting unit for reporting disasters indicated by during flight. The server device includes a determination unit that determines a flight route for flying in the area indicated by the transmitted disaster prevention information, and an instruction unit that instructs the aircraft to fly along the determined flight route.

JP 2019-202682 A JP 2019-086902 A

When an abnormal event occurs during monitoring of facilities in large-scale facilities such as energy production facilities and chemical plants, monitoring from multiple monitoring points is required, so monitoring by multiple aircraft is required. In addition, in the case of an abnormal event such as a fire or gas leak that rapidly expands the area to be monitored, it is required to arrange a plurality of flying objects considering the range of the abnormal event that changes with the passage of time. However, in the flight control method according to Patent Document 1 and the system according to Patent Document 2, the flight paths of a plurality of flying objects are set in consideration of the abnormal event range that changes over time with respect to the detected abnormal event. No such measures have been proposed.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION It is an object of the present invention to provide an aircraft management system that manages a plurality of aircraft performing surveillance flights in consideration of the range of abnormal events that change over time. do.

A flying object management system according to the present invention for managing a plurality of flying objects for monitoring a facility comprises: a flight information management unit for managing flight information including chronological positions of each of the flying objects; A monitoring data acquisition unit that acquires monitoring data of the facility generated by a monitoring device; an abnormal event determination unit that determines an abnormal event that has occurred in or around the facility; and behavior of the determined abnormal event over time. and a special flight for generating a special flight route for each of the flying objects when an abnormal situation occurs based on the temporal behavior estimated by the temporal behavior estimating unit and the flight information and a route generator.

According to this configuration, when the occurrence of an abnormal event in or around the facility is determined by the abnormal event determining unit, the behavior of the abnormal event over time is estimated. Furthermore, abnormal events can be monitored from multiple monitoring positions by using monitoring equipment (camera units, radar equipment, gas detectors, etc.) on multiple aircraft. At that time, based on flight information including the type of abnormal event, the location of the abnormal event, the behavior of the abnormal event over time, and the position of the aircraft over time, multiple special flight routes suitable for monitoring this abnormal situation will be selected. Since it is generated for each vehicle, surveillance flights are performed by multiple vehicles appropriate to the abnormal event that has occurred. In addition, depending on the abnormal situation, a special flight route is generated such that the flying object evacuates from the site of the abnormal event.

In the present invention, the abnormal event determination unit is configured to: , determining the abnormal event based on at least one of the monitoring data provided from the monitoring service center. As a result, it is possible to quickly and accurately find out the occurrence of an abnormal situation in the monitored area from multiple viewpoints using various monitoring data.

In the case of anomalous events such as fires and gas leaks, the range of the anomalous phenomena and the range of adverse effects (concentration distribution of gas leaks, etc.) change depending on climatic conditions, especially wind direction and wind speed. For this reason, in the present invention, a weather information acquisition unit that acquires weather information around the facility is provided, and the temporal behavior estimation unit refers to the weather information when estimating the temporal behavior, and the special flight route generation unit refers to the weather information when generating the special flight route.

When an appropriate special flight route is generated when an abnormal situation occurs, it is convenient to set the starting point of the special flight route to a position close to the current position of the flying object so that the flying object can quickly transition to the special flight route. . For this reason, in the present invention, a flying object self-position acquiring unit for acquiring the flying object self-position calculated by the flying object self-position calculating unit mounted on the flying object is provided. calculating the position over time of each of the flying objects based on the flying object's own position of each of the bodies; With this configuration, the aircraft management system can always grasp the position of each aircraft.

An aircraft usually flies based on a flight plan that describes the relationship between time and flight position. From this flight plan, the position of each vehicle over time can be deduced. In addition, this chronological position is corrected by the aircraft's own position acquired by the aircraft's own position acquisition unit mounted on the aircraft, so that a more accurate relationship between the time of the aircraft and the flight position can be grasped. and the special flight routes generated for each vehicle will be more accurate. For this reason, in the present invention, a flying object self-position acquiring unit for acquiring the flying object self-position calculated by the flying object self-position calculating unit mounted on the flying object is provided. Obtaining a flight plan generated for each vehicle, calculating the position over time of each of the vehicle based on the time and flight positions contained in the flight plan, and obtaining the position over time. modified by the air vehicle self-position.

A proper special flight route can be generated by setting many conditions and simulating. However, in large-scale facilities, the types of abnormal events and the places where abnormal events occur are infinitely different, and the types of special flight routes that can be adapted to them are enormous. A computing device is required. In order to solve this problem, in advance, the flight pattern of the aircraft that is the basis of the combination of the type of abnormal event and the location of the abnormal event is obtained, recorded in an extractable manner, and extracted appropriately when necessary. Based on the flight pattern, it is preferable to generate a special flight route for the actual flying vehicle. Therefore, in the present invention, a flight pattern at the time of an abnormal event, which is defined by the type of the abnormal event and the location of the occurrence of the abnormal event, is recorded so as to be extractable. A recording unit is provided, and the special flight route generation unit refers to the flight pattern extracted based on the type of the abnormal event and the place of occurrence of the abnormal event to create a special flight route for each of the aircraft. to generate

Depending on the type and scale of the event, it may be necessary to continue monitoring the event from near or far from the site of the event. Conversely, depending on the type and scale of the abnormal event, the aircraft may need to suspend surveillance activities and evacuate. It is important that such surveillance activities continue and emergency evacuations follow pre-established routes to avoid confusion associated with the occurrence of abnormal events. Therefore, in the present invention, the flight patterns include an abnormal event monitoring flight pattern for monitoring the abnormal event by the plurality of flying objects, and an emergency event monitoring flight pattern for the plurality of flying objects to evacuate from the abnormal event. evacuation flight pattern. In addition, when an abnormal event is large-scale, it is necessary to monitor the abnormal event by many flying objects. In such a case, the aircraft managed by the same monitoring service center and the aircraft managed by a separate monitoring service center are requested to dispatch support, form a joint formation, and monitor abnormal events. preferably. A joint incident surveillance flight pattern for a joint surveillance flight in conjunction with a support dispatched vehicle may also be included in this incident surveillance flight pattern. Conversely, a support abnormal event monitoring flight pattern for performing a support monitoring flight in response to a request for support dispatch from another facility can also be included in this abnormal event monitoring flight pattern.

In abnormal events such as fires, gas leaks are highly likely to cause secondary disasters, so monitoring gas leaks is important. Moreover, the range of gas leakage damage (range based on the gas concentration level) is greatly affected by wind direction and wind speed. Therefore, in the present invention, when the monitoring equipment includes a gas detector, and the abnormal event includes a gas leak, the temporal behavior estimating unit estimates the temporal behavior by: It is suggested to refer to the wind direction and speed around the facility.

Airplanes are easily affected by weather such as strong winds, which deteriorate flight performance and, in the worst case, may even cause them to crash. Aircraft crashes cause secondary disasters and must be avoided. Therefore, in the present invention, the special flight route generation unit refers to the wind direction and wind speed when generating the special flight route. As a result, a flight route that minimizes the effects of strong winds is adopted.

Surveillance flights by air vehicles are affected by climatic conditions, especially wind speed, and are limited by wind speed information of the monitored area. For example, it is determined whether or not to fly the aircraft based on the wind speed. Therefore, in the present invention, the surveillance activity of the facility by the flying vehicle is restricted based on weather information including wind speed. Furthermore, if an abnormal event involving a gas leak occurs, the aircraft may become an ignition source for the gas leak. Therefore, it is necessary to consider not only the location of the gas leak, but also the spread of the gas leak, which is estimated by the wind speed and direction, and decide whether or not to activate the aircraft to monitor the abnormal event that has occurred. In some cases, it may be necessary to evacuate. For this reason, in the present invention, if the abnormal event includes a gas leak, the flying object that has the possibility of igniting the gas leak is prohibited from conducting surveillance activities, and the above estimated based on the wind speed and wind direction is prohibited. Order to evacuate from the area affected by the gas leak.

Other features, functions and effects of the present invention will be made clear by the following description of the invention using the drawings.

FIG. 10 is a diagram showing an aircraft monitoring a facility; 1 is a diagram showing one form of a plurality of flying vehicles that monitor a facility and its surroundings when an abnormal event occurs; FIG. FIG. 2 illustrates multiple vehicles carried by a ground vehicle; 1 is a functional block diagram showing a schematic configuration of an embodiment of an aircraft management system; FIG. 1 is an information flow diagram showing the flow of data and information between functional blocks of an air vehicle management system; 4 is a flow chart showing an example of a basic routine of monitoring activity in the aircraft management system; 4 is a flowchart showing an example of processing when an abnormal event occurs; FIG. 4 is a schematic diagram showing an example of a formation of flying objects when an abnormal event occurs; FIG. 4 is a schematic diagram showing an example of a flight pattern at the time of an abnormal event; FIG. 4 is a schematic diagram showing an example of an actual aircraft formation created based on an abnormal event flight pattern;

Hereinafter, an aircraft management system according to an embodiment of the present invention will be described with reference to the drawings.

[Overview of aircraft management system]
In the flying object management system according to this embodiment, as shown in FIG. 1, an flying object 3 launched from a ground vehicle 1 as a mobile base (mother ship) moves alone or around a facility to be monitored. Flew in small numbers and monitor for any abnormalities. When an abnormal situation is detected, as shown in FIG. 2, a plurality of flying objects 3 launched from the ground vehicle 1 perform surveillance flights in a predetermined formation to monitor the area where the abnormal situation has occurred. A plurality of flying vehicles 3 are group-controlled (coordinated control) by the control unit 2 of the ground vehicle 1 for mutual collision prevention and effective monitoring.

In this embodiment, as shown in FIG. 3, a plurality of flying objects 3 are parked at a take-off/landing port 20 provided on the ground vehicle 1 and carried by the ground vehicle 1 to a monitoring target area. The ground vehicle 1 is a wheeled vehicle and can move on roads at high speed. The movement of the ground vehicle 1 is managed by a monitoring service center 100 capable of exchanging data with the ground vehicle 1 through a wireless communication line. Group control of the flying vehicles 3 is performed by the control unit 2 mounted on the ground vehicle 1, but in the case of a surveillance flight by the flying vehicles 3 in a large formation, the control unit 2 of the ground vehicle 1 serves as a relay station. , the monitoring service center 100 can also perform group control of the aircraft 3 . In any event, the surveillance flight of vehicle 3 is managed by surveillance service center 100 . The monitoring service center 100 is equipped with a high performance large computer system.

In this embodiment, the monitored object is a gas-related plant having a gas tank, etc., but it is not limited to this, and large-scale facilities such as infrastructure facilities such as chemical complexes and power generation plants are widely monitored. obtain.

[Configuration of aircraft management system]
As shown in FIGS. 4 and 5, the aircraft management system in this embodiment includes a ground vehicle 1 and an aircraft 3, and a monitoring service center 100 is provided as an auxiliary. Various data, information, and various commands can be transmitted and received between the ground vehicle 1, the flying vehicle 3, and the monitoring service center 100 by wireless communication. In addition, the monitoring service center 100 can be connected to an information providing server built in a facility to be monitored or a remote information providing server through a data line such as the Internet so that data can be exchanged.

The aircraft 3 includes a communication unit 30 , an aircraft self-position calculation unit 31 , a flight control unit 32 and a monitoring device 33 . The communication unit 30 communicates with other aircraft 3, the ground vehicle 1, the aircraft management unit 5, and the like. The aircraft's own position calculation unit 31 uses positioning signals from a satellite positioning device and an inertial navigation device mounted on the aircraft 3 to calculate the aircraft's own position, which is its own current position. The flying object's own position is used for its own flight control, and is sent to the other flying object 3 and the ground vehicle 1 through the communication unit 30 . Furthermore, the ground vehicle 1 also exchanges data with the monitoring service center 100 . The flight control unit 32, based on its own flight control program and flight commands sent from the ground traveling vehicle 1, may, depending on the situation, control the flight sent from the monitoring service center 100 using the ground traveling vehicle 1 as a relay base. The flight of the aircraft 3 is controlled based on the command.

In this embodiment, a gas detector 331 and a camera unit 332 are provided as monitoring equipment 33 mounted on the aircraft 3 . The camera unit 332 performs image processing on a camera body, a camera mount that supports the camera body so that the attitude of the camera body can be changed, and captured images, and generates captured image data having attribute values of the camera attitude and the aircraft's own position. The captured image data includes still images and moving images. The gas detection result by the gas detector 331 and the captured image data are sent to the ground traveling vehicle 1 and the monitoring service center 100 through the communication unit 30 as aerial monitoring data. The camera unit 332 can also be used for flight obstacle detection. A dedicated flight obstacle detection device such as a laser may also be provided. Information on the detected flight obstacles (including other flying objects 3) is provided to the flight control unit 32 for obstacle avoidance.

The ground vehicle 1 has a vehicle control unit 10 and an aircraft management unit 5 . The vehicle control unit 10 includes a communication section 16 , a mobile body self-position calculation section 11 , a movement control section 12 , a monitoring device 13 , a weather information acquisition section 14 and a monitoring information creation section 15 . The communication unit 16 communicates with other ground vehicles 1 and the monitoring service center 100, and communicates with information providing servers in facilities and information providing servers at remote locations. The ground traveling vehicle 1 is equipped with a positioning unit similar to a navigation unit provided in a vehicle capable of automatically traveling, and is capable of calculating the current position of the vehicle itself, which is the position of the mobile object itself. Therefore, this positioning unit includes the mobile body self-position calculator 11 . The mobile object's own position is used for its own movement control, and is sent to other ground vehicles 1, aircraft 3, and monitoring service center 100 through communication unit 16. FIG. The movement control unit 12 has a function equivalent to that of an automatic driving control unit provided in a vehicle capable of driving automatically, and based on an automatic driving control program provided by itself and a movement command sent from the monitoring service center 100 , controls the movement (running) of the ground vehicle 1 . Note that the ground traveling vehicle 1 is also provided with a manual travel control section, so that the travel can be controlled by the driver's operation. Note that the camera unit 132 of the ground vehicle 1 can also be used to detect moving obstacles. Also, a dedicated moving obstacle detection device such as a laser or an ultrasonic wave may be provided. Information on the detected moving obstacle is provided to the movement control section 12 for obstacle avoidance.

As monitoring equipment 13 mounted on the ground vehicle 1, a gas detector 131 and a camera unit 132 are provided. The camera unit 132 performs image processing on a camera body, a camera mount that supports the camera body so that the attitude of the camera body can be changed, and captured images, and generates captured image data having attribute values of the camera attitude and the moving body's own position. The captured image data includes still images and moving images. However, the camera unit 132 mounted on the ground traveling vehicle 1 is different in size from the camera unit 132 mounted on the aircraft 3, and can acquire a large-screen image with high resolution. The results of gas detection by the gas detector 131 and the photographed image data are sent to other ground vehicles 1 and the monitoring service center 100 through the communication unit 16 as moving object monitoring data.

The weather information acquisition unit 14 acquires weather information sent from a weather service server or a weather information detection device in the facility. The monitoring information creating unit 15 creates monitoring information based on the monitoring data obtained during the monitoring flight of the flying object 3 and the monitoring data obtained during the monitoring driving of the ground traveling vehicle 1 . send to

The aircraft management unit 5 includes a communication unit 50, an aircraft own position acquisition unit 52, a monitoring data acquisition unit 54, an abnormal event determination unit 55, a temporal behavior estimation unit 58, a flight plan database 63, a special flight route generation unit 70, an abnormal It has an incident flight pattern recording unit 71 and a flight information management unit 6 .

The aircraft own position acquisition unit 52 acquires the aircraft own position sent from the aircraft own position calculation unit 31 provided in the aircraft 3 .

The flight information management unit 6 acquires flight information including the chronological position of the aircraft 3 and the available flight time (based on remaining fuel, remaining battery capacity, etc.) and manages surveillance flights of the aircraft 3 . The flight information management unit 6 includes an aircraft position tracking unit 61 and a flight command generation unit 62 . Furthermore, the flight information management unit 6 uses a flight plan database 63 . The flight plan database 63 may be built in the control unit 2 of the ground vehicle 1, or may be built in another external computer. The flight object position tracking unit 61 reads the flight plan set for each flight object 3 from the flight plan database 63, and based on the time and flight position described in the flight plan, each flight object 3 Estimate and record the position over time (current position). Furthermore, this chronological position is corrected by the flying object's own position acquired by the flying object's own position acquisition unit 52 . The flight command generation unit 62 gives a flight command to the flying object 3 so that the position of the flying object matches the time and flight position in the flight plan. Further, the flight command generator 62 gives a flight command to each flying object 3 so as to fly along a special flight route assigned to each flying object 3 when an abnormal situation occurs.

As an example of a specific flight plan, a monitoring route and a monitoring start date and time are described in advance in the flight plan. After that, it automatically returns to the parking spot. However, the flight information management unit 6 can change the monitoring start date and time and the monitoring route at any timing based on the weather information.

The monitoring data acquisition unit 54 , the abnormal event determination unit 55 , and the temporal behavior estimation unit 58 realize the function of determining abnormal events based on the aerial monitoring data sent from the aircraft 3 . The aerial monitoring data is linked to the monitoring time and the flying object's own position at the monitoring time calculated by the flying object's own position calculator 31 . The monitoring data acquisition unit 54 processes the acquired aerial monitoring data based on the monitoring time and monitoring position, generates monitoring data arranged in chronological order, and supplies the monitoring data to the abnormal event determination unit 55 . The abnormal event determination unit 55 determines whether any abnormal event has occurred in the facility to be monitored based on the monitoring data provided from the monitoring data acquisition unit 54 and the feature data generated from the monitoring data. do. Furthermore, the temporal behavior estimation unit 58 estimates the temporal behavior of the abnormal event determined by the abnormal event determination unit 55, for example, the spread of the abnormal event. At this time, if the abnormal event is a fire or gas leak that is affected by wind, the wind direction and wind speed around the location of the abnormal event based on weather information are referenced.

The flight information management unit 6 includes a special flight route generation unit 70 and an abnormal event flight pattern recording unit 71 in order to realize the function of generating a special flight route for the aircraft 3 when an abnormal situation occurs. The abnormal event flight pattern recording unit 71 records the abnormal event flight pattern in an extractable manner.

The abnormal event flight pattern recording unit 71 records a large number of flight patterns of the aircraft 3 when an abnormal event occurs, which are defined by the type of the abnormal event and the location of the occurrence of the abnormal event. This flight pattern shows a formation in three-dimensional space of the aircraft 3 that is suitable for monitoring abnormal event conditions from the air.

The special flight route generation unit 70 first determines the type of abnormal event, the place of occurrence of the abnormal event, the spread of the abnormal event, the degree of risk of the abnormal event, the number of available aircraft 3, and the number of aircraft 3 that can be used. The optimum flight pattern is extracted using the type of monitoring equipment 33 that is used as an extraction condition. Furthermore, the special flight route generation unit 70 generates a special flight route for the aircraft 3 based on the extracted flight pattern, and provides it to the flight command generation unit 62 of the flight information management unit 6 . Since the flying object 3 is affected by the wind, when a strong wind is generated, the direction and speed of the wind around the facility where the abnormal event is occurring are taken into consideration when generating the special flight route. The flight command generation unit 62 generates a flight command for each flying object 3 based on the special flight route and the current position of the available flying object 3 and gives it to each flying object 3 . In other words, when an abnormal event occurs, it is determined whether or not the abnormal event affects the monitoring activities of the aircraft 3 in consideration of the behavior of the abnormal event over time. The monitoring activity of the flying object 3 is continued, and if it is determined that there is an influence, the monitoring activity of the flying object 3 is stopped.

It should be noted that the vehicle control unit 10 or the monitoring service center 100 may be provided with a special movement route generation section that generates a travel route for the ground vehicle 1 in an abnormal event. Such a special movement route generation unit includes information such as the type of abnormal event, the place of occurrence of the abnormal event, the spread of the abnormal event, the degree of risk of the abnormal event, the number of available ground vehicles 1, the number of available ground vehicles 1 An optimum movement pattern is extracted by using the type of the installed monitoring device 13 as an extraction condition. Further, based on the extracted movement pattern, a special movement route for the ground vehicle 1 is generated, and a movement command based on the special movement route is given to the movement control unit 12 . That is, when an abnormal event occurs, it is determined whether or not the abnormal event affects the monitoring activity of the ground vehicle 1 in consideration of the behavior of the abnormal event over time. , the monitoring activity of the ground vehicle 1 is continued, and if it is determined that there is an influence, the monitoring activity of the ground vehicle 1 is stopped.

Depending on the type and scale of the abnormal event, the ground vehicle 1 and the aircraft 3 need to stop monitoring activities and evacuate in an emergency. In such an emergency evacuation, it is necessary to adopt an appropriate formation according to the type and scale of the abnormal event in order to avoid confusion at the site. Therefore, the flight patterns used by the special flight route generator 70 to create a special flight route include not only an abnormal event monitoring flight pattern for the aircraft 3 to monitor abnormal events, but also an abnormal event monitoring flight pattern for the aircraft 3 to monitor abnormal events. It also includes an emergency evacuation flight pattern to evacuate from. Similarly, for the ground vehicle 1, there are not only abnormal event monitoring movement routes for the ground vehicle 1 to monitor abnormal events, but also emergency evacuation movement routes for the ground vehicle 1 to evacuate from abnormal events. should be given.

As a specific example, when the gas detector 331 mounted on the flight object 3 detects a gas leak, the flight object management unit 5 automatically evacuates to a safe place set according to the flight route. to transmit monitoring data including information such as the location and concentration of gas leaks. Images taken by the camera unit 332 mounted on the flying object 3 are also sent to the flying object management unit 5 as monitoring data. If the flying object 3 has not only the function of the monitoring device 13 but also the function of the abnormal event determination unit 55, when an abnormal event is detected from the facility monitoring by the monitoring device 13, the flying object 3 sends the flying object management unit 5 It is also possible to immediately report an equipment abnormality. When the flying object management unit 5 receives gas leak information, fire information, weather information such as strong winds and rainfall, and abnormalities in facilities to be inspected, the flying object management unit 5 makes the flying object 3 fly based on the special flight route generated by the special flight route generation unit 70. command to

Next, the basic routine of the facility monitoring activity by the aircraft management system of this embodiment will be described with reference to the flowchart of FIG. First, at the garrison of the ground vehicle 1, a predetermined number of flying objects 3 are loaded into the take-off/landing port 20 of the ground vehicle 1 and departed for the facility to be monitored (#01).

When at least one ground vehicle 1 arrives at the facility to be monitored, the normal monitoring movement of the ground vehicle 1 based on the normal ground monitoring plan is started (#02). When the ground vehicle 1 reaches the area where the surveillance activity by the flying vehicle 3 is scheduled (Yes branch of #03), the flying vehicle 3 takes off from the takeoff/landing port 20 of the ground vehicle 1 (#04). As shown in FIG. 8, each flying object 3 performs a solo flight and carries out aerial surveillance according to the assigned flight plan (#05). Each vehicle 3 sends surveillance data generated by the surveillance equipment 13 to the vehicle management unit 5 of the ground vehicle 1 during aerial surveillance. The monitoring data sent from each flying object 3 to the flying object management unit 5 of the ground vehicle 1 is acquired by the monitoring data acquiring section 54 (#06).

The monitoring data acquiring unit 54 provides the abnormal event determining unit 55 with air monitoring data acquired from the aircraft 3 performing a surveillance flight based on the flight plan. The abnormal event determination unit 55 receives aerial monitoring data from the monitoring equipment 33 mounted on the aircraft 3, ground monitoring data from the monitoring equipment 13 mounted on the ground traveling vehicle 1, facility monitoring data from monitoring equipment installed in the facility, Based on at least one piece of external monitoring data provided from an external information service such as the monitoring service center 100, it is determined whether an abnormal event has occurred (#07). If the occurrence of an abnormal event is not recognized (No branch of #08), it is checked whether the monitoring activity based on the flight plan of all aircraft 3 is completed (#09). The processing from step #06 to step #08 is performed until the monitoring activity of all flying objects 3 is completed. If it is determined in step #07 that an abnormal event has occurred (Yes branch at #08), the abnormal event occurrence processing described later is performed (#50).

After completion of such aerial surveillance on the normal flight route, the aircraft 3 lands at the takeoff/landing port 20 (#10). When all flying objects 3 have landed at the take-off/landing port 20, the ground vehicle 1 checks whether there is a facility to be monitored next (#11). If there is a facility to be monitored next (No branch of #11), the process branches to step 02, and the ground vehicle 1 performs the next patrol. If there is no facility to be monitored next (Yes branch of #11), the ground vehicle 1 and the aircraft 3 return to the garrison (#12).

When it is determined that an abnormal event has occurred in step #08 of FIG. 6 (Yes branch of #08), the abnormal event occurrence process shown in FIG. 7 starts (# 50). In the abnormal event occurrence process, first, the temporal behavior estimator 58 estimates the temporal behavior of the abnormal event (#51). The chronological behavior of this abnormal event includes the type of abnormal event, chronological monitoring data group related to this abnormal event, wind direction and wind speed around the location of the abnormal event based on weather information, gas leak alarm, fire information , meteorological information on strong winds, rainfall, etc., and signals indicating abnormalities in facilities to be inspected, etc., as input parameters. For example, in the case of a gas leak, current and future concentration distributions are estimated. Next, a flight pattern that matches the temporal behavior of the abnormal event thus estimated is extracted from the abnormal event flight pattern recording unit 71 (#52). Furthermore, the current position of each flying object 3 is acquired (#53). The movement pattern extracted from the abnormal event flight pattern recording unit 71, which matches the behavior of the abnormal event over time, is the basis for a safe and efficient flight formation in the surveillance flight of a plurality of flying objects 3. be. An example of such a flight pattern is shown in FIG. Although the flight pattern shown in FIG. 9 is a simplified one, four aircraft 3 are spaced apart from each other by a predetermined distance from the boundary of the domain of abnormal event behavior over time, and fly in a clockwise direction. It is a pattern that turns around. In reality, the domain boundary of the behavior over time is a complex shape, and as a result the flight pattern is also a complex shape. Also, in FIG. 9, the flight pattern is shown two-dimensionally for the sake of illustration, but the actual flight pattern is represented in three-dimensional space.

Based on the obtained flight pattern and the current positions of the flying object 3 and the ground vehicle 1 obtained from the flying object position tracking unit 61 and the moving object position tracking unit 64, the special flight route generating unit 70: A special flight route is generated for the flying object 3 participating in the surveillance activity to follow the flight formation indicated by the flight pattern (#54). FIG. 10 shows an actual flight formation of a plurality of aircraft 3 performing surveillance flight on such a special flight route. Although the flight formation of the multiple flying objects 3 shown in FIG. 10 is simplified, it is a flight formation based on the flight pattern of FIG. 9, and actually becomes a more complicated form. Also, the actual flight formation is represented in three-dimensional space.

When the special flight command based on the special flight route is sent to the aircraft 3 (#55), all the aircraft 3 form a flight formation based on the special flight command and fly. Here, even if the flight pattern applied to the aircraft 3 is an abnormal event monitoring movement pattern for monitoring an abnormal event or an abnormal event evacuation movement pattern, the monitoring device 33 is used during the flight. Aerial surveillance is performed (#56). Therefore, the monitoring data acquisition unit 54 can continue to acquire the aerial monitoring data even when an abnormal event occurs (#57).

If the aircraft 3 continues monitoring when an abnormal event occurs (No branch of #58), the processing from step #51 to step #57 is repeated. If the aircraft 3 becomes unnecessary or impossible to monitor when an abnormal event occurs (Yes branch of #57), this abnormal event occurrence processing ends.

Images captured by the camera unit 132 mounted on the ground vehicle 1 and the camera unit 332 mounted on the aircraft 3 are processed to become excellent data for detecting abnormal events. In activities, shooting conditions such as backlight and darkness are often disadvantageous due to the positional relationship with the sun. For this reason, in this embodiment, if the photographing conditions cannot be improved only by changing the attitude of the camera body, the orientation of the ground vehicle 1 and the aircraft 3 can be changed, and the movement route and flight path can be changed in consideration of the direction of the sun and the like. It also has a control function that improves the shooting conditions by changing the route.

If the abnormal event that has occurred is of a large scale and is estimated to spread over a wide area, the ground vehicle 1 traveling near the site of the abnormal event or flying near the site of the abnormal event The flying object 3 alone cannot perform sufficient surveillance. In such a case, either the ground vehicle 1 or another ground vehicle 1 or flying object 3 managed by the monitoring service center 100 is directly requested for assistance, or the support is registered in another monitoring service center 100 . A support dispatch for the ground vehicle 1 and the air vehicle 3 can be requested through another monitoring service center 100 . At that time, the traveling route and flight route for joint surveillance with the ground vehicle 1 and the aircraft 3 included in the support unit are applied. In particular, in the abnormal event flight pattern recording unit 71, an abnormal event monitoring flight pattern that serves as a base for creating a flight route for joint monitoring is recorded. The special flight route generation unit 70 creates a joint abnormal event monitoring flight route by referring to the optimum abnormal event monitoring flight pattern extracted from the type and range of the abnormal event and the number of aircraft to be dispatched for support. Each vehicle 3 is given flight commands based on a joint abnormal event monitoring flight route.

As is clear from the above description, when an abnormal event occurs, it is also possible to take measures such as those exemplified below according to the type of the abnormal event.
(1) A case in which the gas detector 331 mounted on the aircraft 3 detects a gas leak:
When the gas detector 331 mounted on the flight object 3 detects a leak of gas with a high risk of explosion or the like, the flight object 3 automatically evacuates to a safe place based on a special flight route, and the control unit 2 or Notify the monitoring service center 100 of the location and concentration of the gas leak. The control unit 2 or the monitoring service center 100 performs the following remote control over the ground vehicle 1 including other flying vehicles 3 and moving ground robots.
a) Explosion of gas leaked from the travel route of the flying object 3 and the travel route of the ground vehicle 1 in the behavior of the abnormal event over time estimated based on the measured value of the anemometer, the gas leak detection location, and the gas leak concentration. If it is judged that there is a possibility of reaching the lower limit concentration (5 to 15% of the explosive limit concentration of methane), move to the nearest safe place where it is judged that the leaked gas does not reach the aircraft 3 that is the ignition source. The aircraft 3 is evacuated and the power source of the aircraft 3 is stopped.
b) For flying objects 3 other than the above, the monitoring route is changed so that the affected locations are monitored from outside the safe isolation for the effects of leaking gas.

(2) Cases of disasters such as on-site fires, tsunamis, and storm surges:
The control unit 2 or the monitoring service center 100 that receives disaster occurrence information such as fires, tsunamis, and storm surges from the central monitoring and control system of the plant equipment monitoring station, based on the flight pattern at the time of an abnormal event and the movement pattern at the time of an abnormal event, The following commands are given to the flying object 3 in flight and the ground vehicle 1 in motion.
a) Evacuate the aircraft 3, which may be damaged by radiant heat of the fire, outside the safety isolation and monitor the fire situation from outside the safety isolation.
b) The flying object 3, which is damaged by tsunami and storm surge, raises its flight altitude and monitors the damage situation from a safe altitude. The ground vehicle 1, whose movement route is assumed to be flooded by tsunami and storm surge, is evacuated to a safe place.
c) For aircraft 3 and ground vehicles 1 other than the above, the surveillance route is changed so that the location is monitored from outside the safe separation.

(3) Cases in which abnormalities in monitoring target facilities (equipment) are detected:
When the control unit 2 or the monitoring service center 100 detects an abnormal event in the equipment to be monitored based on the monitoring data, the aircraft 3 and the ground vehicle 1 that are on standby or in the process of monitoring are approached near the location of the abnormal event. command to perform detailed monitoring. The detailed inspection here means that a plurality of aircrafts 3 and ground vehicles 1 monitor abnormal events from different angles and distances.

Furthermore, the control unit 2 or the monitoring service center 100 remotely controls the monitoring activities of the aircraft 3 and the ground vehicle 1 in conjunction with weather information. for example,
(a) If the measured value from the anemometer is estimated to exceed the operational guarantee limit value of the flying object 3 and the ground traveling vehicle 1, cancel the monitoring activity by the flying object 3 and the ground traveling vehicle 1 at the relevant location. . Further, the flying vehicle 3 and the ground vehicle 1 start inspection when receiving an inspection start instruction from the control unit 2 or the monitoring service center 100 .
(b) The aircraft management unit 5 of the ground vehicle 1 or the monitoring service center 100 determines the camera body and If it is determined that the optical sensor may be affected by direct sunlight depending on the direction and angle of the sun, the flight that changes the inspection route of the aircraft 3 or changes the flight route and attitude of the aircraft 3 Commands can be given to the aircraft 3 .
(c) When the control unit 2 or the monitoring service center 100 determines that the flying object 3 is facing a tailwind or a headwind based on the measured value from the wind speed and direction meter, the flying object 3 is operated as a countermeasure against battery consumption. Command 3 to change the flight route.

[Another embodiment]
(1) In the above-described embodiment, the flying object 3 is configured as an automatically controlled flying object, but it may be configured as a remote controlled flying object that is at least partially operated by remote control. In the case of a remote-controlled flying object, information such as a flight command is notified to the remote controller operator through a monitor or the like as steering support information during remote control operation.

(2) In the abnormal event occurrence processing in the above-described embodiment, when an abnormal event occurs, a plurality of flying vehicles 3 form a surveillance flight formation to perform surveillance activities, and the ground vehicle 1 waits in a safe place. I thought I would. However, since the ground vehicle 1 is also equipped with the monitoring equipment 13, when approaching the location where an abnormal event occurs, it is based on a special movement route created based on the movement pattern at the time of an abnormal event. Participate in surveillance activities. For this reason, the control unit 2 may be provided with an abnormal event movement pattern recording section and a special movement route generation section for the ground vehicle 1 .

(3) In the above-described embodiment, the monitoring equipment 13 mounted on the ground vehicle 1 and the monitoring equipment 33 mounted on the aircraft 3 were gas detectors 131, 331 and camera units 132, 332. Other devices such as air pressure sensors, ultrasonic sensors, radar, etc. may be used. Various cameras such as a visible light camera and an infrared camera can be used as the camera bodies of the camera units 132 and 332 . Also, a plurality of types of monitoring devices 33 may be mounted, respectively, or only one type of monitoring device 33 may be mounted.

(4) In the above-described embodiment, the temporal behavior estimating unit 58 predicts the temporal behavior of the abnormal event determined by the abnormal event determining unit 55, that is, predicts the future of the abnormal event. Estimation, that is, estimating the cause of an abnormal event, for example, in the case of a gas leak, may be configured to estimate the source of the gas leak. Furthermore, as the gas detector 131 , a camera-type gas detector may be mounted on the ground vehicle 1 . With this camera-type gas detector, it is possible to check whether or not gas leakage has reached the take-off direction of the aircraft 3 . As the gas detector 331 , a laser gas detector may be mounted on the aircraft 3 . With this laser type gas detector, it is possible to check whether or not gas leakage has reached the flight direction of the aircraft 3 . In addition, if measurement data from a gas leak detector and an anemometer installed at the same location can be acquired, the gas leak location and gas leak concentration can be determined from the concentration value of the gas leak detector and the value of the anemometer. It is also possible to estimate

(5) In the above-described embodiment, the flying vehicle management unit 5 is mounted on the ground vehicle 1, but is installed independently from the ground vehicle 1 at another location, such as a management service company. It may be provided in a computer. Also, the aircraft management unit 5 may be provided in a portable computer and be freely movable. Furthermore, each functional section constructed in the flying vehicle management unit 5 may be distributed to a plurality of computers, and some of them may be provided in the ground vehicle 1 and the flying vehicle 3 .

(6) In the above-described embodiment, the ground vehicle 1 is provided with the takeoff/landing port 20 in which the aircraft 3 is parked. Alternatively, the takeoff/landing port 20 may be provided on a dedicated takeoff/landing port vehicle. Alternatively, a fixed take-off/landing port 20 installed on the ground may be used.

It should be noted that the configurations disclosed in the above embodiments (including other embodiments, the same shall apply hereinafter) can be applied in combination with configurations disclosed in other embodiments as long as there is no contradiction. The embodiments disclosed in this specification are exemplifications, and the embodiments of the present invention are not limited thereto, and can be modified as appropriate without departing from the object of the present invention.

INDUSTRIAL APPLICABILITY The present invention can be applied to an aircraft management system that manages multiple aircraft that monitor facilities.

1 : Ground vehicle 2 : Control unit 3 : Aircraft 5 : Aircraft management unit 6 : Flight information management unit 14 : Weather information acquisition unit 15 : Monitoring information creation unit 20 : Takeoff/landing port 31 : Aircraft position calculation unit 33 : Monitoring equipment 331 : Gas detector 332 : Camera unit 52 : Aircraft own position acquisition unit 54 : Monitoring data acquisition unit 55 : Abnormal event determination unit 58 : Temporal behavior estimation unit 61 : Aircraft position tracking unit 62 : Flight command Generating unit 64 : Moving body position tracking unit 70 : Special flight route generating unit 71 : Abnormal event flight pattern recording unit 100 : Monitoring service center

Claims (11)

An aircraft management system for managing a plurality of aircraft for monitoring a facility, the flight information management unit for managing flight information including chronological positions of each of the aircraft;
a monitoring data acquisition unit that acquires monitoring data of the facility generated by monitoring equipment mounted on the aircraft;
an abnormal event determination unit that determines an abnormal event that has occurred in or around the facility;
a temporal behavior estimating unit for estimating the temporal behavior of the determined abnormal event;
a special flight route generation unit that generates a special flight route for each of the aircraft when an abnormal situation occurs, based on the flight information and the behavior over time estimated by the behavior estimation unit over time;
A vehicle management system comprising a The abnormal event determination unit is configured to: 2. The aircraft management system of claim 1, wherein said abnormal event is determined based on at least one of the monitoring data provided from. a weather information acquiring unit for acquiring weather information around the facility;
3. The aircraft according to claim 1, wherein the temporal behavior estimation unit refers to the weather information when estimating the temporal behavior, and the special flight route generation unit refers to the weather information when generating the special flight route. management system. a flying object self-position acquiring unit for acquiring the flying object self-position calculated by the flying object self-position calculating unit mounted on the flying object;
4. The aircraft management system according to any one of claims 1 to 3, wherein the flight information management unit calculates the chronological position of each aircraft based on the aircraft own position of each aircraft. a flying object self-position acquiring unit for acquiring the flying object self-position calculated by the flying object self-position calculating unit mounted on the flying object;
The flight information management unit acquires a flight plan generated for each of the aircraft, and calculates the chronological position of each of the aircraft based on the time and flight position included in the flight plan. 4. The flying object management system according to any one of claims 1 to 3, wherein the position over time is calculated and corrected by the acquired flying object own position. an abnormal event flight pattern recording unit that extractably records the flight pattern of the aircraft at the time of the occurrence of the abnormal event defined by the type of the abnormal event and the location of the occurrence of the abnormal event;
2. The special flight route generating unit refers to the flight pattern extracted based on the type of the abnormal event and the place of occurrence of the abnormal event to generate the special flight route for each of the aircraft. 6. The aircraft management system according to any one of 1 to 5. The flight patterns include an abnormal event monitoring flight pattern for monitoring the abnormal event by a plurality of the flying objects, and an emergency evacuation flight pattern for evacuating the abnormal event by the plurality of flying objects. 7. The aircraft management system of claim 6. The monitoring device includes a gas detector, and if the abnormal event includes a gas leak, the temporal behavior estimation unit refers to the wind direction and wind speed around the facility when estimating the temporal behavior. The aircraft management system according to any one of claims 1 to 7. 9. The aircraft management system according to claim 8, wherein the special flight route generation unit refers to the wind direction and the wind speed when generating the special flight route. 10. The aircraft management system according to any one of claims 1 to 9, wherein surveillance activities of said facility of said aircraft are restricted based on weather information including wind speed. If the abnormal event includes a gas leak, prohibit surveillance activities by the flying object that has the possibility of igniting the gas leak, and remove the gas leak from the range estimated based on the wind speed and wind direction. 11. The aircraft management system according to any one of claims 1 to 10, which prompts evacuation.

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