Exploring the Range of Weather Impacts on UAS Operations

The use of Unmanned Aerial Systems (UAS) is proliferating rapidly.  As new regulations are introduced to assimilate UAS into the National Airspace System (NAS), there is an increased need to understand the role of weather.  Weather can affect UAS operations in various ways, such as limiting visibility, interfering with communication and navigation, affecting aircraft performance, reducing flight duration, and even causing damage to the aircraft.  All of these situations have the potential to affect mission success.  Additionally, given the current requirement to maintain unaided visual line of sight (VLOS) on the aircraft at all times, the operator, remote pilot in command (PIC), and any other visual observers are also exposed to weather effects on the ground, such as glare, temperature, humidity, and wind.  This presentation provides a broad survey of the weather impacts on unmanned operations in VLOS conditions and discusses how things may change in beyond visual line of sight (BVLOS) conditions.