BETA Begins North Carolina eIPP Operations for Rural Healthcare

BETA Tech­nolo­gies has begun flight oper­a­tions in North Car­oli­na under the US Depart­ment of Trans­porta­tion and Fed­er­al Avi­a­tion Administration’s eVTOL Inte­gra­tion Pilot Pro­gram (eIPP), using its all-elec­tric ALIA CTOL air­craft to test poten­tial health­care logis­tics mis­sions.

The oper­a­tions, con­duct­ed through North Carolina’s eLIFT pro­gramme, began on Sep­tem­ber 17 and are intend­ed to exam­ine how elec­tric air­craft could con­nect region­al med­ical cen­tres with com­mu­ni­ty hos­pi­tals and rur­al and coastal areas. The cam­paign includes sim­u­lat­ed deliv­er­ies of med­ical sup­plies and equip­ment, includ­ing a deploy­able med­ical field tent, as well as flights involv­ing health­care part­ners across the state.

BETA is work­ing with the North Car­oli­na Depart­ment of Trans­porta­tion, Metro Avi­a­tion, ECU Health and WakeMed. The flight cam­paign has cov­ered more than 1,300 nau­ti­cal miles and includes routes designed around poten­tial future health­care con­nec­tions, includ­ing between Raleigh Exec­u­tive Jet­port and Pitt-Greenville Air­port and com­mu­ni­ties served by Dare Coun­ty Region­al Air­port.

The pro­gramme will use BETA’s exist­ing Charge Cube at Raleigh Exec­u­tive Jet­port, which was installed in 2024. More than 15 addi­tion­al charg­ing loca­tions are under devel­op­ment across North Car­oli­na, with the aim of cre­at­ing the infra­struc­ture required for a wider net­work of elec­tric air­craft oper­a­tions.

The tri­als are also intend­ed to exam­ine how elec­tric avi­a­tion could sup­port health­care ser­vices dur­ing dis­rup­tions to sur­face trans­port. North Carolina’s coastal areas are vul­ner­a­ble to hur­ri­canes, flood­ing and storm surge, which can affect road and fer­ry con­nec­tions. Future oper­a­tions are expect­ed to assess whether elec­tric air­craft could move med­ical sup­plies and health­care per­son­nel when con­ven­tion­al trans­port routes are unavail­able.

BETA said the pro­gramme is also focused on devel­op­ing a repeat­able oper­at­ing mod­el for rur­al health­care access, includ­ing the move­ment of crit­i­cal sup­plies, spe­cial­ist teams and poten­tial­ly patients in future oper­a­tions.

The company’s North Car­oli­na activ­i­ties also include its Mor­risville facil­i­ty, which devel­ops and tests flight-con­trol com­put­ers for its elec­tric air­craft. BETA said the site has cre­at­ed near­ly 70 jobs since open­ing in 2023.

Thomas Sleightholm

Thomas is a con­tent writer for eVTOL Insights, cov­er­ing all aspects of the glob­al Advanced Air Mobil­i­ty ecosys­tem. Got a sto­ry for him? Please send an email to editorial@evtolinsights.com

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