Maintenance Ecosystem of Small Unmanned Aircraft System (sUAS) in Military Aviation

India’s commercial drone industry is growing and the drone market is expected to become a multi-billion-dollar industry over the next decade. In this drone era, the smaller drone systems, that is, small Unmanned Aircraft System (sUAS) are also gaining traction in Indian armed forces for use in Intelligence, Surveillance, Reconnaissance (ISR) and as armed sUAS for kamikaze role.

The robust sUAS is technology-dependent and capable of autonomous operation in highly challenging, contested and congested environments. The technology verticals like Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning may induce wide applications of sUAS to perform tasks that normally require human intelligence like making predictions or taking action.

Considering the future of aviation and its implications on the Indian armed forces, great challenges are being seen in the sUAS operations and maintenance aspects. Even though the operations are heading towards automation with lesser human intervention, maintenance of these systems is likely to remain human-centric for a long period of time. Maintenance ecosystem depends on its skilled tradesmen and the technical infrastructure. As the maintenance philosophy of sUAS is different from the traditional maintenance of conventional aircraft and of bigger UAS, a study is essential in this initial stage itself, to suggest measures for a robust maintenance ecosystem that can adapt to the technological disruptions and strengthen maintenance safety.