Risk Assessment and Failure Analysis for an Innovative Remotely-Piloted Airship

This paper is focused on the process of safety assessment for the demonstrator of the Elettra-Twin-Flyers (Nautilus Spa), an innovative radio-controlled airship for monitoring, telecommunications, advertising and reconnaissance missions in maritime, border and inland environments. The whole process is accomplished in accordance with the recent regulatory principles for the civil Unmanned-Air-Vehicles and the guidelines of specific standards, such as IEC 61508 and DO-178B. An accurate risk analysis, based on the hazard identification, the hazard analysis and the risk assessment, is carried out on all the subsystems and components of the airship demonstrator. Moreover, the failure impact and fallout on the innovative command system is modelled and simulated through the advanced ETF Flight Simulator.