A UTM simulator based on ROS and Gazebo

Abstract

This paper presents a simulation framework for the development and testing of UTM functionalities. The simulator is based on the U-space functional architecture and services. U-space includes pre-flight services (before the UAV is allowed to take-off) and in-flight services (when the UAV is flying). There are many in-flight services that are not currently implemented (or only partialy) and, as far as we know, there is not a simulation framework that tackle this. Our UTM simulator is based on the Robot Operating System (ROS) and Gazebo and it allows to implement and test U-space in-flight services, speeding up their development and allowing to implement new functionalities. We show the implementation of a use-case of the EU-funded project GAUSS that involves rotary and fix-wing UAVs flying on a shared environment.