ALEXANDRIA, Va., Aug. 5 -- United States Patent no. 12,698,092, issued on Aug. 4, was assigned to The Boeing Co. (Arlington, Va.).
"System and method for breakaway during air-to-air refueling" was invented by Jung Soon Jang (Bellevue, Wash.) and Justin Cleve Hatcher (Sumner, Wash.).
According to the abstract* released by the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office: "A boom guidance system for use during an automated air-to-air refueling (A3R) mission. The boom guidance system includes sensors configured to output sensor data indicative of a three-dimensional (3D) position of a fuel-receiving aircraft (receiver) and a refueling boom of a fuel-supplying aircraft (tanker) in a tanker reference frame and a boom reference frame, respectively. An electr...