FAA approves first US public-use vertiport in Blackstone, Virginia

The FAA has issued the first con­di­tion­al approval for a Ver­ti­port at Allen C. Perkin­son Black­stone Army Air­field (KBKT), in Black­stone, Vir­ginia, cre­at­ing a path for the air­port to estab­lish the first licensed pub­lic-use Ver­ti­port in the US.

NAVOS Air, a Vir­ginia-based air nav­i­ga­tion ser­vices com­pa­ny, was the pro­po­nent of the Ver­ti­port, as part of a project fund­ed by the Vir­ginia Inno­va­tion Part­ner­ship Cor­po­ra­tion (VIPC) through the Vir­ginia Com­mon­wealth Cen­ter of Inno­va­tion for Autonomous Sys­tems (C2IAS) grant pro­gram.

Black­stone Army Air­field (KBKT) is a dual-use air­port for mil­i­tary and civil­ian flight oper­a­tions. After it is licensed by the Vir­ginia Depart­ment of Avi­a­tion, the Ver­ti­port will be estab­lished and used as part of research on an end-to-end con­cept of oper­a­tions NAVOS Air devel­oped based on mod­i­fy­ing and design­ing ter­mi­nal instru­ment pro­ce­dures and enroute infra­struc­ture specif­i­cal­ly for Uncrewed Air­craft Sys­tem (UAS) and AAM uses, with Ver­ti­ports serv­ing as anchors to that sys­tem.

NAVOS Air tech­ni­cal direc­tor Matt Bur­ton said: “Lever­ag­ing exist­ing approved infra­struc­ture meth­ods mod­i­fied for new use cas­es and research appli­ca­tions will enable AAM oper­a­tions soon­er while pro­vid­ing oppor­tu­ni­ties to inform the devel­op­ment of future air traf­fic man­age­ment sys­tems and facil­i­ties. Des­ig­nat­ing Ver­ti­ports is part of the begin­ning of real progress towards enabling AAM.”

NAVOS Air was the pro­po­nent of the Ver­ti­port as part of a research project using an Uncrewed Air­craft Sys­tem (UAS) to rep­re­sent larg­er AAM vehi­cles for instru­ment flight oper­a­tions research.

These spe­cial instru­ment pro­ce­dures have the poten­tial to deliv­er UAS/AAM to air­port loca­tions, off-air­port loca­tions, and new­ly estab­lished Ver­ti­ports. Addi­tion­al­ly, they will facil­i­tate the inte­gra­tion of emerg­ing air­space users with lega­cy users, while max­imis­ing the effi­cien­cy and safe­ty of air­space in this new era of avi­a­tion.

Dur­ing its research, NAVOS Air also analysed des­ig­nat­ing a heli­port to be served by instru­ment pro­ce­dures that were opti­mised for UAS oper­a­tions. This allowed NAVOS Air to quick­ly work with the FAA when the guid­ance for Ver­ti­port design was released in late 2022 to gain approval for the first Ver­ti­port and take the next step to enabling AAM.

Vir­ginia Depart­ment of Avi­a­tion direc­tor Greg Camp­bell added: “We con­grat­u­late VIPC, Navos and the air­port spon­sor on their efforts to cre­ate the first pub­lic-use ver­ti­port in the com­mon­wealth. This devel­op­ment aligns with Virginia’s estab­lished role as a leader in the devel­op­ment of unmanned sys­tems and emerg­ing tech­nolo­gies.”

The project was con­duct­ed with the Vir­ginia Tech Mid-Atlantic Avi­a­tion Part­ner­ship (MAAP), which pro­vid­ed air­wor­thi­ness review and flight autho­riza­tion. UAV Pro enabled oper­a­tions and safe­ty man­age­ment at Black­stone Army Air­field. Tex­tron Sys­tems oper­at­ed the Tex­tron Aerosonde UAS for the project’s flight tests.

VIPC estab­lished C2IAS in col­lab­o­ra­tion with Vir­ginia Tech Uni­ver­si­ty and Old Domin­ion Uni­ver­si­ty for advanc­ing unmanned sys­tems tech­nol­o­gy. Its mis­sion encom­pass­es com­mer­cial­is­ing exist­ing research, facil­i­tat­ing the cre­ation of new com­pa­nies, pro­mot­ing applied research in unmanned sys­tems, and dri­ving sub­stan­tial cap­i­tal invest­ment and job cre­ation with­in the state of Vir­ginia.

Tra­cy Tynan, direc­tor of the Unmanned Sys­tems Cen­ter at VIPC con­clud­ed: “Pro­vid­ing fund­ing for the NAVOS Air Ver­ti­port project is a prime exam­ple of the impact C2IAS has made to dri­ve inno­va­tion in Vir­ginia.

“The Vir­ginia Unmanned Sys­tems Cen­ter at VIPC is a valu­able resource for nur­tur­ing start­up ven­tures and sup­port­ing cut­ting-edge research that con­tin­ue build­ing on the state’s nation­al lead­er­ship in unmanned sys­tems.”

Ear­li­er this year, VIPC con­duct­ed an eco­nom­ic impact study with NEXA Advi­sors of McLean that projects the AAM indus­try in Vir­ginia has the poten­tial to gen­er­ate $16 bil­lion in new busi­ness activ­i­ty and cre­ate more than 17,000 full-time jobs in the aero­space and sup­port­ing indus­tries dur­ing the next 23 years.

By 2045, it is antic­i­pat­ed that over 7.7 mil­lion pas­sen­gers annu­al­ly, which is equiv­a­lent to more than 21,000 pas­sen­gers per day, will trav­el in AAM air­craft with­in Vir­ginia.