Project Airship

Team Name

Airship Crew

Timeline

Summer 2025 – Fall 2025

Students

• Christian McClain – Computer Engineering
• Arshdeep Singh – Computer Engineering
• Lauren Allbright – Computer Engineering
• Brandon Garibay – Computer Science
• Ahmed Omar – Computer Science

Abstract

The Autonomous Cargo Blimp is a small model of a self-navigating aerial system designed to transport lightweight cargo across local areas. It uses helium and electric motors for propulsion and directional control, enabling vertical takeoff and landing (VTOL). GPS and sensor input allow it to follow predefined routes, maintain stable altitude using a PID control system, and detect objects in front of it. Communication between the blimp and the ground station is handled via Wi-Fi. While cargo handling and autonomous navigation are future goals, the focus is creating the 3 layered systems of a flight controller, communications hub, and a ground station. The critical goal is to create tools that a bigger scale version of this airship would have while also simulating the challenges that an aerial system would face.

Background

The freight transportation industry is dominated mostly by just 3 modes of transportation: planes, trucks, and trains. Each with their own set of problems and benefits. Planes are expensive, while trucks are slow, often affected by traffic, and trains can only travel along predetermined paths using railway tracks. This is why a new rush of companies are creating a new method of freight transportation, that not only solves these problems but also comes as a more ecofriendly form of freight travel. This method is to create airships capable of transporting freight and goods autonomously.

These airships use gas as a primary source of lift and use propellers as adjustments and assistance along with other technologies to float and travel through the air. This mode of transportation provides a low-emission alternative to trucks and planes, and being electric or hybrid, reduces the risk of exposure to fuel price volatility. Furthermore, autonomous operation of these vehicles cuts labor costs and provides safety for workers.

However, creating an airship comes with its own set of engineering challenges and problems. We wanted to create a smaller version of an autonomous cargo airship and understand key components and features required to create a helium powered airship and face the challenges many companies in the world are trying to solve.

Project Requirements

Motors and Propellers to Change Altitude – The upward propellers will lift the airship and adjust the altitude, and the forward propellers will help move and rotate the airship while in the air.

• Manual Flight Control – The airship shall support full manual control from the ground station, including throttle, yaw, pitch, and altitude adjustments.

• Obstacle Avoidance during Flight – The blimp shall detect and avoid obstacles in its flight path using sensor input.

• Buoyancy Generation – The airship will use helium inside its envelope to help generate lift.

• PID Controlled Altitude Adjustment – The altitude adjustment must be controlled by a PID controller and must accommodate environmental factors to keep the airship at a set altitude.

• Wireless Communication with Ground Station – The airship should be able to wirelessly communicate with a ground station to receive and control commands and send telemetry data. The connection should allow real-time adjustments and monitoring.

• National Electric Code (NEC) Compliance – Any electrical wiring must be completed in compliance with all requirements specified in the National Electric Code. This includes wire runs, insulation, grounding, enclosures, over-current protection, and all other specifications.
  
• Vision-Based Landing Zone Detection – The system shall use an onboard camera to analyze terrain and detect safe, flat surfaces for landing.

Design Constraints

• Constructability/Manufacturability: Blimp architecture must be durable enough to handle regular use, outside conditions, and cargo transportation.
• Standards: The airship should meet with aerial regulations that a drone or a larger airship model is required for safe operation.
• Functionality: The blimp should be controlled manually or autonomously through a wireless, on the ground, control system. The blimp should use GPS to define routes and sensor data to help navigate the environment.
• Sustainability: The code for the devices needs to be organized and stored on GitHub to beshared with the customer. The design for the airship must be modular to easily allow for additions and changes in the future.
• Environmental: There should be no use of hydrogen due to flammability, and the device needs to incorporate helium as a major source of lift in the final design.
• Extensibility: The length of the routes taken by the blimp are limited by the power provided by the battery. The larger the battery, the longer the routes that will become navigable. The power draw of electrical components, such as motors, micro controllers, breakout boards, and sensors will increase the need for a larger battery. The current flight time is 10 to 15 minutes.
• Cost/Economic: The cost of refilling the envelope can become costly to the consumer, which can affect its maintainability. Gas leakage must be minimal during operation.
• Safety & welfare: The large propellers mounted on the blimp can cause injury due to that factor; the blimp must be operated at a distance, and the integrated emergency stop feature must be quickly accessed.

Engineering Standards

• U.S Code of Federal Regulations – 14 CFR Part 107 – Small Unmanned Aircraft Systems – The legal procedures in order to fly a drone in the United States. Our project ensured the regulations were met by weighing less than 55 lbs, visual observer was always present, and a control station was created to control the blimp.
• OSHA Compliance: Part 1910.101 Compressed gases (general requirements) – Safety procedures for compressed gas cylinders. We met this standard by following UTA’s procedure on lockout and tagout in compressed gas cylinders and properly handled the pressure relief actuators on the cylinders.
• IEEE Standard for Information Technology -Telecommunications and Information Exchange between Systems Local and Metropolitan Area Networks–Specific Requirements Part 11: Wireless LAN Medium Access Control (MAC) and Physical Layer (PHY) Specifications – provides specifications for how devices communicate wirelessly. Our project met the standard by communicating from the Ground Station to the blimp wirelessly.
• National Electric Code – NFPA 70E: Standard for Electrical Safety in the Workplace – A guide to make sure safe usage of electricity – We adhered to the standard in our project by making sure all wires were insulated, protective equipment was maintained, and batteries had risk assessments.
• GitHub Docs: Best practices for repositories – A recommendation on how to organize, document, and securely store code into GitHub. Project Airship followed this practice by creating a README file and choosing to commit to the main branch instead of forking.

System Overview

The autonomous cargo blimp system combines hardware, onboard processing, communication, and ground station components to ensure safe and intelligent flight. Sensors like a PiCamera, IMU, and GPS gather live environmental data, while the Raspberry Pi processes this data locally, performing tasks such as edge detection and flat ground detection through computer vision to find suitable landing spots. A Flask-based server manages data flow and acts as the communication link between the airship and the operator interface. Live camera streams and sensor data are transmitted wirelessly to the ground station, where a GUI enables users to monitor the system and send commands. This modular setup guarantees real-time control, autonomy, and expandability, allowing the blimp to navigate and land safely in various testing situations.

Results

Currently, all hardware components are communicating efficiently with minimal delays. In manual control, all the motors can be controlled manually to the ground station. In PID mode, motors activate on command and change speed depending on altitude, Weight distribution is still off as the blimp tends to tilts as it’s trying to get off the ground. Optimizations to the PID controllers(s) and construction of a better envelope for the blimp would be the next steps in regard to future work.

Future Work

• Automatic flight control
• Implementing emergency protocol
• Obstacle detection

Project Files

Project Charter
System Requirements Specification
Architectural Design Specification
Detailed Design Specification
Color-Coded Wiring Schematic
Basic Logic Block Diagram
Poster
Closeout Materials

References

• Hybrid Air Vehicles. Rethinking the skies: Zero-emissions air services, 2025.
• National Air and Space Museum. Goodyear “pilgrim” gondola, 1925. Available at:https://airandspace.si.edu 
• Federal Aviation Administration. Title 14, Code of Federal Regulations, Part 107: Small UnmannedAircraft Systems. Electronic Code of Federal Regulations (e-CFR), 2016.
• Federal Aviation Administration. Certification procedures for products and articles, § 21.17 des-ignation of applicable regulations. Title 14, Code of Federal Regulations (CFR), Aeronautics andSpace, Chapter I, Subchapter C, Part 21, Subpart B, 2025.