A reactive method for collision avoidance in industrial environments

Abstract

This paper presents a reactive method for collision avoidance with multiple aerial vehicles that has been applied in real time considering industrial environments. The proposed method is based on the 3D-Optimal Reciprocal Collision Avoidance algorithm. The main contribution of the proposed method is that it takes into consideration 3D modeled static obstacles. Therefore, it has been successfully applied in realistic industrial environments with the presence of complex static obstacles. Considerations of dynamic constraints of the aerial vehicles have been added. The algorithm has been integrated in ROS framework and tested in simulation. Several simulations with up to eight aerial vehicles have been performed, including long endurance cooperative missions. Finally, the second main contri- bution consists in the evaluation of several real ex- periments with up to four aerial vehicles which have been carried out in the testbed of the Center for Ad- vanced Technologies (CATEC) facilities. The aerial ve- hicles ew in the presence of static obstacles and avoided potential collisions by modifying the planned trajecto- ries in real-time.