Congratulations go out to the mechanical and aerospace engineering AIAA (American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics) team for a great finish at the international AUVSI (Association for Unmanned Vehicle Systems International) Student Unmanned Aerial Systems Challenge. Out of 48 registered teams from around the world, including India, Romania, Canada, Germany, Turkey, and Israel, the team placed seventh overall. The team also received special recognition this year for outstanding sportsmanship after lending some mission critical equipment to another team.
The competition was held at an annex of the Patuxent River Navy base in Maryland. The main goal of this competition is for each student team to build an autonomous air vehicle that is capable of various tasks assigned by the judges. The main tasks were waypoint navigation, target search and imaging, and target characterization, with a number of secondary objectives included. The competition also includes teams to complete a technical report about the system and a flight readiness review oral presentation.
This was Rutgers Engineering’s best performance in the four years since first participating in this competition. “For the past two years we have placed 11th with fewer registered teams,” said Timothy Beyer, president of the Rutgers chapter of AIAA. “We aim to do even better next year by breaking into the top five teams. With the continued support of the School of Engineering and our student members I firmly believe that this is possible.”