Ruby M., Salbego N. French Air Force AcademyThis paper presents an adaptive algorithm for autolanding of a fixed wing UAV on an aircraft carrier. The algorithm is characterized by the specific feature of implementing suitable adaptivity in order to improve the ability of a UAV in performing the automatic landing on a moving runway, such as an aircraft carrier. Furthermore, in order to consider the specific requirements and constraints associated to the autonomous approach and landing of a UAV on an aircraft carrier, the algorithm properly takes into account the procedures typically used by Navy's pilot to land on the aircraft carrier. The paper is structured into several paragraphs describing both the proposed algorithm and its numerical validation results. More in details, in the paper first a summary state-of-the-art of autolanding algorithms is outlined, then the overall Guidance, Navigation and Control system architecture, where the autolanding algorithm is integrated, is introduced and the proposed algorithm is described. The design philosophy is illustrated, which is based on the consideration of the autolanding trajectory generation problem according to two stages: the plan of a nominal trajectory applicable to the ideal case and the periodical regeneration, real time during the mission, of a new trajectory, according to the current state of both vehicle and carrier. In the second part of the paper, finally, the synthetic environment used for the numerical validation of the proposed algorithm is described and the results of the validation campaign are reported and commented, showing the effectiveness of the proposed algorithm even in presence of external disturbances.