Integration of path planning and following control for the stratospheric airship with forecasted wind field data

The absence of real-time airspeed sensors, which was more often ignored in previous studies, and low dynamic characteristics render stratospheric airship control challenging. This study creatively overcomes the aforementioned problems in an integrated path planning and following control scheme using forecasted wind field data. Herein, an efficient and practicable path planning algorithm is designed. Further, a smooth vector field guidance law is proposed for solving the problem of complex path following. Subsequently, an event-triggered neural network-based adaptive tracking controller is designed, considering the wind forecast error influence. Finally, these three parts are organically integrated to achieve autonomous flight. The stability of the closed-loop system and the exclusion of Zeno behavior are rigorously proved. The simulation results reveal that the convergence rate is 63.8% improved, essentially exhibiting better optimization, the tracking errors are eliminated within 80 s, and 99.4% control input updating times are saved.