Bringing command and control of unmanned air vehicles down to earth

Operators of unmanned air vehicles (UAVs) will face multiple, complex, co-occurring tasks, including mission planning, command and control, communications, payload control, and coordination with other assets. This workload is multiplied as single operators begin to control multiple UAVs. Developing appropriate decision support tools for the operator is challenging in part because neither doctrine nor technology are far enough along to usefully constrain the problem space. In this paper we describe our work (funded by the Office of Naval Research) in anticipating the likely demands to be placed on a UAV operator in the context of a highly network-centric theater of operations. We then identify high-payoff technologies that will work in concert to make the operator´s tasks manageable even under accelerated operational tempos, and present our preliminary architecture that integrates our existing technology with planned advances in supporting human-computer interaction.