07/09/10 — Piasecki Aircraft-Carnegie Mellon flight demonstrate autonomous helicopter collision avoidance and landing zone selection system for casualty evacuation and transport. Piasecki Aircraft Corp. and Carnegie Mellon University have developed and successfully flight-tested a navigation/sensor system that enables full-size, autonomous helicopters to fly at low altitude while avoiding obstacles; to evaluate and select suitable landing sites in unmapped terrain; and to land safely using a self-generated approach path. Autonomous flight at low altitude and landing zone evaluation/selection is an unprecedented feat with a full-size helicopter. This technology has been developed to allow future unmanned helicopters to evacuate wounded soldiers from contaminated or…