Joby Prepares for First Wave of Air Taxi Pilot Training with CAE Flight Simulators

Joby Avi­a­tion has accept­ed the first of two flight sim­u­la­tors devel­oped in part­ner­ship with CAE, which will enable the com­pa­ny to expand its eVTOL pilot train­ing pipeline and ulti­mate­ly sup­port up to 250 pilots a year.

The first gen­er­a­tion of the 3000 series sim­u­la­tor — a fixed-based train­ing device — will start instal­la­tion this month at Joby’s recent­ly expand­ed man­u­fac­tur­ing and pilot train­ing cen­ter in Mari­na, Cal­i­for­nia. The sec­ond unit, a full-motion sim­u­la­tor, is expect­ed to arrive lat­er this year.

The first sim­u­la­tor is expect­ed to be qual­i­fied by the FAA as a Lev­el 7 Flight Train­ing Device; the sec­ond will be a Lev­el C, Full Flight Sim­u­la­tor that sim­u­lates Joby’s air­craft on all axes of motion.

Both are sched­uled to be qual­i­fied amongst the high­est Fed­er­al Avi­a­tion Admin­is­tra­tion (FAA) clas­si­fi­ca­tions for flight sim­u­la­tion, pro­vide the ultra-real­is­tic envi­ron­ment required for com­mer­cial sin­gle-pilot eVTOL oper­a­tions and are equipped with the same sim­u­la­tion tech­nol­o­gy used to train pilots for the world’s lead­ing air­lines.

Bon­ny Simi, Pres­i­dent of Oper­a­tions for Joby Avi­a­tion, said: “These sim­u­la­tors are cen­tral to the FAA cer­ti­fi­ca­tion process and are being deliv­ered on time to sup­port pilot train­ing ahead of Joby’s first com­mer­cial flights planned for this year.

“Devel­op­ing flight sim­u­la­tors that are ful­ly qual­i­fied by the FAA takes years of work and access to air­craft data, and it is required for Part 135 oper­a­tions of eVTOL air­craft in the Unit­ed States. Hav­ing start­ed this mul­ti-year process with CAE in 2022, Joby is pro­gress­ing in devel­op­ing qual­i­fied, scal­able pilot train­ing infra­struc­ture as we near com­mer­cial oper­a­tions.”

Both sim­u­la­tors fea­ture a 300-by-130-degree field of view, pro­vid­ing pilots with an unob­struct­ed, ful­ly immer­sive visu­al expe­ri­ence dri­ven by CAE’s next-gen­er­a­tion CAE Prodi­gy Image Gen­er­a­tor (IG), which lever­ages gam­ing tech­nol­o­gy through Epic Games’ Unre­al Engine, pro­vid­ing high­ly real­is­tic detailed 3D urban visu­als for more real­is­tic pilot train­ing in a vir­tu­al envi­ron­ment.

Along with its high-fideli­ty visu­als, the sim­u­la­tor includes audio cues, tur­bu­lence, and vibra­tion sys­tems that close­ly mir­ror real-world flight con­di­tions, includ­ing the unique con­di­tion of wind flow around ground-based struc­tures.

Simi added: “These high-fideli­ty sim­u­la­tors are designed to be a dig­i­tal twin of our air­craft, pro­vid­ing us a means of com­pli­ance and a robust tool to help pre­pare our pilots for the unique demands of high-vol­ume oper­a­tions in urban envi­ron­ments.”

CAE’s immer­sive envi­ron­ment lever­ages AI to cre­ate detailed 3D build­ings and life­like urban envi­ron­ments, deliv­er­ing a seam­less train­ing back­drop for air taxi oper­a­tions.

Alexan­dre Prévost, Pres­i­dent of Civ­il Avi­a­tion at CAE, said: “CAE is proud to part­ner with Joby to bring world-class sim­u­la­tion tech­nol­o­gy to the emerg­ing eVTOL mar­ket. These sim­u­la­tors set a new bench­mark for train­ing infra­struc­ture in urban air mobil­i­ty.

“By lever­ag­ing decades of exper­tise in high-fideli­ty sim­u­la­tion, we are help­ing Joby pre­pare pilots for safe, effi­cient oper­a­tions and sup­port­ing the industry’s tran­si­tion to sus­tain­able air trans­porta­tion.”

Joby began work­ing with CAE in 2022 to ensure the sim­u­la­tors would be qual­i­fied ahead of their launch aircraft’s entry into ser­vice. 

Over sev­er­al years, Joby, in col­lab­o­ra­tion with CAE, has devel­oped and rig­or­ous­ly test­ed sim­u­la­tor com­po­nents and soft­ware using a com­bi­na­tion of sim­u­lat­ed, emu­lat­ed, and real hard­ware equip­ment across facil­i­ties in Mari­na, San­ta Cruz, and San Car­los, Cal­i­for­nia, along with the Company’s soft­ware devel­op­ment facil­i­ty in Cos­ta Rica. The sys­tem repro­duces all aspects of flight physics and human fac­tors, ful­ly align­ing with FAA flight sim­u­la­tor qual­i­fi­ca­tion stan­dards.