Competition

The Competition
The competition is held annually at Rutan Field in the Mojave Desert in southern California by the California Unmanned Aerial Systems Competition (C-UASC). Teams travel from around the world to represent their school, state, and country with a demonstration of their aircraft's capabilities. The competition consists of two parts: a design competition and a flight demonstration.

Mojave Air & Space Port

Design Competition

The Design Competition Submission is due on May 16. The competition rates the innovation employed in the technical design and engineering of the drone, as well as the flight readiness of the drone's system.

The Mission Demonstration takes place between June 5th and 7th. The mission consists of 6 separate functions representative of real-world applications. The drone completes these tasks autonomously with a human safety pilot on standby in the event of a systems failure.

Mission Demonstration

2026 Competition Course

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Meet Our Sub-teams:
Each sub-team consists of members from the many different majors that work together to streamline the implementation of various systems into the final product.

Members of the Airframe team are responsible for building the fuselage, wings, and the propulsion and power system. The airframe team is responsible for all structural and electro-mechanical features on-board the Uninhabited Aerial Vehicle (UAV) such as bay doors, motors, servos, and aircraft control surfaces. The airframe team is responsible for providing power to all necessary on-wing systems including the ODLC computing device (owned by the External Software team) and the optical system (owned by the optics team). Members of this team primarily consist of mechanical, aerospace, and electrical engineering students who want to perform design work and then build physical systems and components themselves.

Members of the Guidance Navigation Control (GNC) team are responsible for the: (1) aircraft’s avionics and all on-board systems responsible for ensuring the aircraft knows where it is and what it is supposed to be doing, (2) the payload’s descent control and stabilization system that ensures the air-dropped payload hits its target. The GNC team is responsible for the aircrafts flight controller, and autopilot system. Members of this team primarily consist of aerospace and electrical engineering students who want to perform software design work and then code controllers.

Members of the Mechanisms team are responsible for building all mechanical systems aboard the UAS. This includes payload devices such as the revolver mechanism, payload deployment systems, and the corresponding microcontrollers. In addition to payload systems, the mechanisms team works on landing gear and other critical mechanical systems. Members of this team primarily consist of computer science, and mechanical and electrical engineering students who want to perform design work and then build physical systems and components themselves.

Members of the Software Core team work on the core systems that allow the aircraft to function. They interface the onboard avionics systems, flight controllers, cameras, computers, and communication devices to create a robust wholistic UAS. This core system aims to be fully autonomous, regulating the communications between every piece of hardware onboard the aircraft and during every part of the mission.

Members of the External Software team develop algorithms that locate, identify, and classify targets on the ground, and stitch individual images together into full orthomosaics. The team uses artificial intelligence and machine learning (AI/ML) algorithms to detect targets in images taken by the UAV's camera. Their algorithms identify the shape of the target, its color, and the alpha-numeric symbol painted on the target. The External Software team also utilizes the onboard communication devices to manage communication between the UAS and the ground station operators.

Members of the Optics & Avionics team determine imaging system requirements and select a system to meet those requirements. The optics team is responsible for all electro-mechanical systems that steer the camera, damp vibrations, and transmit images to the on-board computing device (owned by ODLC). Members of this team primarily consist of mechanical and electrical engineering students who want to develop sub-component requirements and identify existing systems that can meet those requirements.

The Integration and Testing (I&T) team is in charge of testing all relevant systems for the mission. Whenever a product team needs to test a system, they will inform the I&T team to make sure the proper aerial systems are prepared to perform a flight test. The I&T team is tasked with effectively running frequent test flights and gathering the needed data. They conduct test reports and evaluate the data to drive further tests. This team consists of all majors, as this is the final step for all systems to prepare for their mission.

Competition

Mojave Air & Space Port

Design Competition

Mission Demonstration

2026 Competition Course

Meet Our Sub-teams: Each sub-team consists of members from the many different majors that work together to streamline the implementation of various systems into the final product.

Meet Our Sub-teams:
Each sub-team consists of members from the many different majors that work together to streamline the implementation of various systems into the final product.