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Electra-MIT team secures US Air Force STTR contract for developing eSTOL aircraft flight controls

The Unit­ed States Air Force has award­ed Elec­tra a Small Busi­ness Tech­nol­o­gy Trans­fer (STTR) con­tract in part­ner­ship with the Mass­a­chu­setts Insti­tute of Tech­nol­o­gy (MIT), to advance the devel­op­ment of flight con­trol sys­tems for Electra’s hybrid eSTOL air­craft. 

In addi­tion to the Air Force’s new agile com­bat employ­ment doc­trine to pro­vide mid­dle- and last-mile dis­trib­uted car­go or island-hop­ping logis­tics, hybrid eSTOL air­craft will sup­port run­way-inde­pen­dent oper­a­tions, where an air­field may no longer be acces­si­ble, with pre­ci­sion land­ing capa­bil­i­ties.

The STTR Phase II con­tract will fast-track Electra’s devel­op­ment of pre­ci­sion flight con­trol sys­tems for repeat­able low-speed, ultra-STOL land­ings, which enable Elec­tra to safe­ly oper­ate its eSTOL air­craft in spaces no larg­er than a soc­cer field. 

Elec­tra plans to demon­strate the flight con­trol sys­tem on a full-scale hybrid eSTOL tech­nol­o­gy demon­stra­tor air­craft dur­ing flight test­ing lat­er this year. 

The award fol­lows a Phase I con­tract last year, under which the Elec­tra-MIT team devel­oped an eSTOL aero­propul­sive mod­el, a vehi­cle siz­ing tool, and a flight con­trol per­for­mance sim­u­la­tion. 

“We are delight­ed to con­tin­ue work­ing with MIT and the U.S. Air Force to devel­op state-of-the-art flight con­trol sys­tems for ultra-STOL air­craft,” said Chris Courtin, Electra’s Lead Engi­neer of Flight Physics and Con­trols. 

“Reli­able pre­ci­sion land­ings are key to Electra’s abil­i­ty to deliv­er run­way-inde­pen­dent oper­a­tions with increased pay­load, range, and safe­ty for both mil­i­tary and com­mer­cial users.

“We are hon­oured to be select­ed for this con­tract, and look for­ward to expand­ing our tech­nol­o­gy devel­op­ment part­ner­ships to bring this capa­bil­i­ty to mar­ket.”

Dr Steven Hall, Pro­fes­sor of Aero­nau­tics and Astro­nau­tics at MIT and for­mer chair of the MIT AeroAs­tro fac­ul­ty, who is the Tech­ni­cal Lead for the MIT team, added: “Electra’s dis­trib­uted elec­tric propul­sion approach has great promise to improve STOL air­craft per­for­mance. We are excit­ed for this oppor­tu­ni­ty to work with Elec­tra and USAF to help devel­op the flight con­trol sys­tem on this inno­v­a­tive air­craft.”

In Feb­ru­ary, Elec­tra was award­ed a Phase III Small Busi­ness Inno­va­tion Research con­tract from the U.S Air Force, through the Air Force Agili­ty Prime pro­gramme, for flight test­ing a full-scale hybrid eSTOL tech­nol­o­gy demon­stra­tor air­craft lat­er this year. 

Elec­tra was pre­vi­ous­ly award­ed an Agili­ty Prime SBIR Direct-to-Phase II con­tract ear­li­er last year, which accel­er­at­ed the devel­op­ment of Electra’s hybrid-elec­tric propul­sion sys­tem tech­nol­o­gy. 

Also in Feb­ru­ary, the com­pa­ny part­nered with Yugo to help expand air urban mobil­i­ty ser­vices in the Asia-Pacif­ic region, by deploy­ing up to 12 eSTOL air­craft to enable high-speed trans­porta­tion ser­vices for pas­sen­gers and poten­tial­ly car­go. 

Elec­tra’s eSTOL air­craft can oper­ate from spaces as small as 300x100 feet using dis­trib­uted elec­tric propul­sion and blown lift tech­nol­o­gy, and will car­ry up to 1,800 pounds of car­go or nine pas­sen­gers up to 500 miles. 

A small tur­bine-pow­ered gen­er­a­tor recharges the bat­ter­ies mid-flight, elim­i­nat­ing the need for new ground charg­ing infra­struc­ture. 

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Jason Pritchard

Jason Pritchard is the Editor of eVTOL Insights. He holds a BA from Leicester's De Montfort University and has worked in Journalism and Public Relations for more than a decade. Outside of work, Jason enjoys playing and watching football and golf. He also has a keen interest in Ancient Egypt.

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