Velocity Obstacle Based 3D Collision Avoidance Scheme for Low-Cost Micro UAVs

An unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) must be able to safely reach its destination even, when it can only gather limited information about its environment. When an obstacle is detected, the UAV must be able to choose a path that will avoid collision with the obstacle. For the collision avoidance scheme, we apply the velocity obstacle approach since it is applicable even with the UAV's limited sensing capability. To be able to apply the velocity obstacle approach, we need to know the parameter values of the obstacle such as its size, current velocity and current position. However, due to the UAV's limited sensing capability, such information about the obstacle is not available. Thus, by evaluating sensor readings, we get the changes in the possible positions of the obstacle in order to generate the velocity obstacle and make the UAV choose a collision-free trajectory towards the destination. We performed simulation on different obstacle movements and the collision-free trajectory of the UAV is shown in the simulation results.