National Aeronautics and Space Administration

www.nasa.gov

AOSP Newsletter

Airspace Operations and Safety Program (AOSP)

JUL-SEP 2021 | Quarter 4

ATM-X and AAM Present to RTCA 

SC-228 WG-2

6

SWS Kicks-Off Awards with 

Academic Partners

14
2 AOSP NEWSLETTER // JUL-SEP 2021

AOSP IN THE NEWS

NASA Funds Lidar-Based 

Urban Weather Sensing

Aviation Week (8/31) reports 

“unique weather conditions in urban 

landscapes are a key challenge for 

the safety and reliability of advanced 

air mobility (AAM) operations that 

will require the development of new 

sensing and forecasting capabilities. 

Challenges include the complex 

flow fields at low altitude in built-up 

areas and...”

NASA Is Testing Electric Air 

Taxis with Joby Aviation

The Verge (9/01) reports NASA 

kicked off test flights of electric 

vertical take-off and landing 

(eVTOL) aircraft — colloquially 

referred to as “flying cars” — with 

Joby Aviation, the Northern 

California company that recently 

went public. 

NASA Joby EVTOL Testing 

Paves Way for Electric 

Air Taxis in Cities

SlashGear (9/1) reports “NASA 

revealed in an announcement today 

that it recently began testing an 

electric vertical takeoff and landing 

(eVTOL) aircraft, a first for the 

space agency and a move toward 

bringing ‘air taxis’ to big cities. 

According to NASA, it will conduct 

its eVTOL tests through Sept. 10, 

gathering data on the use of these 

all-electric aircraft as a potential 

future transportation option.”

NASA Flight Tests of Futuristic 

‘Air Taxi’ are Finally Underway

Gizmodo (9/1) reports “the first 

official tests of Joby Aviation’s allelectric vertical takeoff and landing 

(eVTOL) vehicle have begun. NASA 

is leading these tests, which it’s 

doing to foster the development of 

similarly advanced aircraft. This 

marks the first inclusion of an 

eVTOL vehicle in NASA’s Advanced 

Air Mobility National Campaign. 

By partaking in the developmental 

flight tests of a commercial aircraft, 

NASA hopes to ‘advance airspace 

mobility’ in the United States, and 

‘help integrate air taxis, drones and 

other inventive new vehicles into the 

national airspace,’ according to an 

agency press kit.” 

NASA and Joby Kick Off 

EVTOL Flight Tests

FlightGlobal (9/2) reports “NASA 

and US air taxi developer Joby 

Aviation have started a ten-day 

flight-test programme using Joby’s 

in-development air taxi – part of a 

NASA effort to help advance ‘urban 

air mobility’ technology. The flights 

kick off a broader NASA project 

under which the agency will partner 

with several companies developing 

electric vertical take-off and landing 

(eVTOL) aircraft.”

NASA is Testing a StraightFrom-Science-Fiction 

Electric Air Taxi

The Hill (9/3) reports “NASA kicked 

off testing of an all-electric vertical 

takeoff and landing (eVTOL) aircraft 

that could eventually fly cargo and 

passengers around busy cities in the 

not-too-distant future. The U.S. 

space agency teamed up with electric 

aircraft startup Joby Aviation to 

conduct developmental flight tests of 

the company’s six-rotor air taxi near 

Big Sur, Calif.”

NASA Starts Testing Electric 

Air Taxi For 1st Time

SPACE (9/3) reports “NASA has 

started testing a future air taxi that 

might soon be flying cargo and 

passengers in busy cities, helping to 

ease annoying traffic jams. The allelectric vertical takeoff and landing 

(eVTOL) aircraft, designed by 

California startup Joby Aviation, is 

a helicopter powered by six rotors. It 

was designed to be as quiet as possible 

in order to fit into busy city life 

without disturbing residents.”

NASA Starts Flight Testing 

with Joby’s Electric Air Taxi

Engadget (9/4) reports “NASA just 

took an important step toward 

making flying taxis a practical reality. 

The agency has started flight testing 

with Joby Aviation’s electric VTOL 

aircraft to help model and simulate 

future airspace with these taxis in 
AOSP NEWSLETTER // JUL-SEP 2021 3

AOSP IN THE NEWS

service. The dry run began quietly, 

on Aug. 30, and will last through 

Sept. 10. The effort will include 

noise check using 50 microphones 

to gauge the “acoustic profile” of the 

air taxi throughout the course of a 

given flight.”

NASA is Testing Out a 

New Air Taxi Prototype

Universe Today (9/6) reports 

“NASA is commonly thought of as 

America’s space agency, but its name 

also emphasizes another research 

area. The National Aeronautics 

and Space Administration is also 

America’s civilian aerospace research 

organization. In that role, it has 

been instrumental in developing 

new technologies ranging from 

rocket engines to aircraft control 

systems. Part of that role is running 

the Advanced Air Mobility (AAM) 

campaign to test autonomous drone 

technology. The latest milestone 

in that campaign was testing an 

electric vertical takeoff and landing 

(eVTOL) helicopter intended for 

eventual use as an air taxi.”

NASA and the FAA Hope 

this New Software Will 

Reduce Flight Delays, 

Carbon Emissions

Washington Post (9/28) reports “the 

Federal Aviation Administration 

on Tuesday unveiled a new system 

designed to make air travel more 

efficient by reducing the amount 

of time planes spend sitting on the 

taxiway. Software developed by 

NASA will enable officials to more 

precisely pinpoint when planes 

should push away from their gate for 

takeoff. By reducing the amount of 

time aircraft spend waiting, airlines 

can cut the amount of fuel they use.”

Feds Aim to Reduce Lines of 

Planes Waiting to Take Off

AP (9/28) reports “Federal officials 

plan to roll out software at 27 

large U.S. airports that they hope 

will eliminate long lines of planes 

waiting to take off while also slightly 

reducing fuel consumption. ... 

NASA developed the software and 

has tested it since 2017 at Dallas/

Fort Worth International Airport 

and Charlotte Douglas International 

Airport in North Carolina.”

U.S. FAA To Deploy Software 

to Reduce Airport Delays

Reuters (9/28) reports “the Federal 

Aviation Administration (FAA) said 

Tuesday it plans to deploy a new 

software capability to reduce taxi 

times and ramp congestion for flights 

at 27 major U.S. airports. The FAA 

and NASA said the new software was 

tested for four years that calculates 

gate pushbacks at busy hub airports 

‘so that each plane can roll directly to 

the runway and to take off.’ When 

deployed, the FAA said it anticipates 

annually saving more than 7 million 

gallons (26.5 million liters) of fuel 

and eliminating more than 75,000 

tons of CO2 emissions.”

FAA And NASA Develop 

Software to Reduce Taxi 

Delays and Cut Fuel Burn

FlightGlobal (9/29) reports “the 

Federal Aviation Administration 

and NASA have developed software 

that promises to improve efficiency 

at major airports across the USA by 

reducing taxi times, flight delays 

and, as a result, lower fuel burn and 

greenhouse gas emissions. The two 

agencies on 28 Sept. published test 

results of software that ‘calculates 

gate push-backs at busy hub airports 

so that each plane can roll directly to 

the runway and to take off’.” 

This Software Aims to Make 

Your Flight Smoother—

And Help the Planet

Wired (9/28) reports “Fastening the 

seat belt buckle and knowing your 

flight is on its way to its destination: 

Nice. Getting stuck in a tarmac 

traffic jam and waiting for your 

flight to take off: Not so nice. Turns 

out the wait is also not nice for the 

planet. ... Taking off and landing 

is usually just a short part of a 

flight, but accounts for a quarter of 

its emissions, according to NASA. 

Unnecessary plane stops during that 

process increase fuel use. It would 

be better for everyone—passengers 

included—if airplanes smoothly 

exited and entered airports.” 
4 AOSP NEWSLETTER // JUL-SEP 2021

AOSP IN THE NEWS

Departure-Optimization 

Software Ready for 

Deployment, FAA Says

Aviation Week (9/28) reports “the 

FAA is set to begin widespread 

deployment of software that 

integrates data from several existing 

systems and calculates optimal 

pushback times to minimize delays 

between the gate and departure. 

Tested for nearly four years under 

the NASA-led Airspace Technology 

Demonstration 2 (ATD-2)...” 

FAA Unveils New System 

to Reduce Planes’ 

Times on Taxiway

The Hill (9/29) reports “the Federal 

Aviation Administration (FAA) has 

worked with NASA to develop a 

new software that calculates specific 

times when planes should push back 

from gates in order to limit delays 

on taxiways and reduce the amount 

of fuel used by aircraft as they wait 

to take off. The new system was 

unveiled by the FAA on Tuesday 

following the completion of nearly 

four years of research and testing at 

several flight hubs across the country, 

including airports in Charlotte, 

Dallas-Fort Worth and Atlanta.”
AOSP NEWSLETTER // JUL-SEP 2021 

TECHNICAL AND PROGRAMMATIC HIGHLIGHTS

ATM-X Attends European 

Concept of Higher Airspace 

Operations Project Workshop 

POC: JAEWOO JUNG

From June 29 to July 1, a team 

from the Air Traffic Management 

– eXploration project’s Extensible 

Traffic Management (xTM) 

subproject attended the European 

Concept of Higher Airspace 

Operations (ECHO) project’s 

virtual workshop. ECHO will 

deliver a comprehensive demand 

analysis and a concept of operations 

for higher airspace traffic 

management. The project is setting 

up a number of large-scale industry 

information and consultation 

events. In the workshop, ECHO 

project partners provided 

inputs on the initial demand 

for higher airspace operations 

including analysis of studies and 

research, scenario use cases and 

design, vehicles and operational 

specificities, and principles and 

assumptions. This is the first in a 

series of three thematic workshops 

that xTM intends to observe. 

NASA Awards Grant to Boeing 

for the V&V 2045 Vision NRA 

POC: GUILLAUME BRAT

On July 8, NASA awarded a grant 

to Boeing for the Validation and 

Verification (V&V) 2045 Vision 

NASA Research Announcement 

(NRA) call. This NRA was 

a collaboration between the 

System-Wide Safety project and 

the Transformative Aeronautics 

Concepts Program’s Transformative 

Tools and Technologies project. The 

goal of the proposal is to provide 

a comprehensive landscape of 

the future needs in software and 

system V&V for autonomous 

aviation cyber-physical-human 

systems (including both ground 

and airborne systems), develop a 

roadmap for the development of 

V&V needs for the corresponding 

applications in autonomy and 

aviation, and to identify where 

novel V&V techniques are needed 

to address gaps in the regulatory 

framework. The Boeing-led team 

includes industry partners Collins 

Aerospace and General Electric, 

academic advisors Ella Atkins of the 

University of Michigan, Chuchu 

Fan of the Massachusetts Institute 

of Technology, Ufuk Topcu of the 

University of Texas at Austin, and 

government advisors from the 

Federal Aviation Administration 

and the Air Force Research 

Laboratory. The kickoff meeting 

is tentatively planned for Aug. 13. 

The grant will be monitored by 

Guillaume Brat of NASA’s Ames 

Research Center in California, with 

the help of additional researchers 

from both NASA’s Langley 

Research Center in Virginia and 

Ames Research Center in California. 

AOSP Participates in 

SAE G 34/Working Group 

on AI in Aviation

POC: KURT SWIERINGA AND MISTY DAVIES

In early July, two AOSP projects 

participated in the SAE G-34 

Working Group (WG-114) Artificial 

Intelligence (AI) in Aviation Working Group. On July 1, the Air Traffic 

Management – eXploration project 

met with the SAE G-34 Committee Chair and discussed how they 

might contribute to the SAE G-34/

Working Group (WG-114) Artificial 

Intelligence in Aviation Working 

Group. SAE G-34/WG-114 focuses 

on implementation and certification related to artificial intelligence 

technologies for the safer operation 

of aerospace systems and aerospace 

vehicles. This group has been active 

since 2019 and has approximately 

500 contributors around the planet. 

This group is an industry standards 

committee that is creating the first 

standards and guidance for the use 

of machine learning in aviation. 

Kurt Swieringa of NASA’s Langley 

Research Center in Virginia is joining the working group to provide a 

NASA Air Traffic Management – 

eXploration airspace perspective. On 

July 8 and 9, several System-Wide 

Safety project staff members participated in a virtual SAE G-34 and 

EUROCAE Working Group plenary 

meeting. Topics included harmonization with related committees, gaps 

5
6 AOSP NEWSLETTER // JUL-SEP 2021

TECHNICAL AND PROGRAMMATIC HIGHLIGHTS

related to the assignment of Design 

Assurance Levels, changes to the 

requirements flow-down process, 

and the determination of the operating domain. 

ATM-X and AAM Present 

to RTCA SC-228 WG-2 

POC: RAFAEL APAZA

On July 14, the Air Traffic 

Management – eXploration (ATM-X) 

and Advanced Air Mobility (AAM) 

projects presented overviews of their 

respective work to the Radio Technical Commission for Aeronautics 

Special Committee-228 (RTCA 

SC-228). This briefing informed 

RTCA of NASA’s activities in the area 

of Advanced Air Mobility, with an 

emphasis on communications. 

Communication, Navigation, and 

Surveillance (CNS) technical lead, 

Casey Bakula, and other representatives from NASA’s Glenn Research 

Center in Cleveland presented the 

ATM-X CNS work being executed 

within the Urban Air Mobility 

(UAM) Airspace Management subproject under ATM-X. Several RTCA 

members expressed an interest in 

collaborating with NASA on multiple 

activities, so the projects are working 

on future follow-up discussions. 

SWS Awards Grant to 

Flight Safety Foundation 

POC: MISTY DAVIES AND KYLE ELLIS

The System-Wide Safety project 

awarded a grant to the Flight Safety 

Foundation in July. During the 

next two years, the Flight Safety 

Foundation will provide input to 

NASA on the In-Time Aviation 

Safety Management System 

(IASMS) concept of operations 

and will engage with the broader 

aviation safety management system 

communities and stakeholders 

to develop a mapping between 

today’s safety management system 

and the future IASMS. The 

Flight Safety Foundation will also 

help NASA educate and engage 

with stakeholders about IASMS 

development and benefits. 

UAM Airspace Management 

subproject Hosts NC-1 

Airspace Partners 

Kickoff Meeting

POC: ARWA AWEISS

On July 20, the Air Traffic 

Management – eXploration’s Urban 

Air Mobility (UAM) Airspace 

Management subproject successfully 

conducted a kickoff meeting 

with seven National Campaign-1 

(NC-1) airspace partners that 

will participate in the UAM X4 

simulation activity through June 

2022. NASA’s Advanced Air 

Mobility (AAM) project’s National 

Campaign entered into a nonreimbursable Space Act Agreement 

with the following airspace partners: 

ANRA Technologies Inc., ARINC 

Incorporated, Avision Inc., Metron 

Aviation Inc., OneSky Systems 

Inc., SkyGrid, and Unmanned 

Experts Inc. The kickoff meeting 

was the first opportunity to 

discuss the activity’s objective, 

approach, proposed providers of 

services for UAM capabilities, and 

schedule, as well as an opportunity 

for the airspace partners to ask 

questions and to provide initial 

feedback. During X4, the Airspace 

Management subproject will work 

with industry to continue evolving 

the UAM airspace architecture, to 

identify additional information 

exchanges needed to support initial 

UAM operation in the National 

Airspace System, and to prepare 

airspace partners that plan to 

participate in the NC-1 flight test. 

ATM-X Attends the FAA’s 

BNE Virtual Exhibition Day 

POC: KURT SWIERINGA

On July 21, the Air Traffic 

Management – eXploration project 

team attended the FAA’s Advanced 

Air Mobility Beyond Visual Line of 

Sight (BVLOS) National Airspace 

System Evaluation (AAM BNE) 

virtual exhibition day. The exhibition 

included both presentations on the 

FAA’s AAM BNE activity and live 

flights. The AAM BNE activity has 

the objectives of identifying limits 

of current communications, 

navigation, and surveillance services, 

evaluating BVLOS operations, 

and evaluating Air Traffic Control 

procedures for large unmanned 

aircraft system missions in the 

National Airspace System. 
AOSP NEWSLETTER // JUL-SEP 2021 

TECHNICAL AND PROGRAMMATIC HIGHLIGHTS

ATM-X ETM Team Holds 

Two-Day Virtual ETM 

Workshop with FAA 

POC: JAEWOO JUNG

On July 21-22, the Air Traffic 

Management – eXploration 

project’s Upper Class E Traffic 

Management (ETM) team 

participated in a two-day virtual 

ETM workshop with members of 

the FAA’s ETM Research Transition 

Team (RTT). The workshop was 

hosted by the NASA Aeronautics 

Research Institute. On Day 1 of 

the workshop, an overview of 

NASA’s and FAA’s ETM work 

was provided, along with a panel 

on the ETM concept, including 

formulation of the RTT and ETM 

research and development efforts 

such as operational intent modeling 

and conflict identification. Four 

breakout sessions were held 

on Day 2, including panels on 

ETM services and architecture, 

operational intent, ETM operator 

data needs, and considerations 

for global operations. Outcomes 

from the sessions were reported 

back to the group. More than 140 

people from industry, academia, 

and government agencies registered 

for the workshop. The NASA and 

FAA ETM teams plan to continue 

engagement with the ETM 

community with another workshop 

in the future. 

Website: https://nari.arc.nasa.gov/

etm2021workshop 

NASA ATM-X DIP Meeting 

with FAA/ANG 

POC: MIRNA JOHNSON

On July 23, leadership teams from 

AOSP, the Airspace Technology 

Demonstration project, and the Air 

Traffic Management – eXploration 

project’s Digital Information 

Platform subproject team met 

with Steve Bradford and Diana 

Liang from the FAA’s NextGen 

organization. This was an informal 

discussion to initiate NASA/FAA 

coordination of NASA’s Digital 

Information Platform and services 

demonstrations. The early demos 

beginning in FY22 will support 

FAA’s analysis and investment 

decisions for flight object and flow 

object. The conversation focused 

on technical goals and approach 

for these demonstrations. NASA 

and the FAA agreed that the best 

mechanism for coordination would 

be the Digital Mesh Technology and 

Applications Research Transition 

Team. Follow-up meetings will be 

held to further discuss the oceanic 

flight deck work that the FAA is 

leading through FY23 and how 

NASA can contribute for FY24/

FY25 follow-on work. 

AEWG CCWG: Transitions 

of IASMS Across AAM 

Epochs Using S-Curves 

POC: MISTY DAVIES AND KYLE ELLIS

On July 27, the Advanced Air 

Mobility (AAM) Ecosystem 

Working Group Cross-Cutting 

Working Group met to discuss 

“Transitions of In-Time Aviation 

Safety Management Systems 

(IASMS) Across AAM Epochs 

Using S-Curves.” The event focused 

on examining requirements for 

IASMS as the AAM ecosystem 

evolves over time, which has been 

portrayed as a series of S-curve 

epochs. Across each transformative 

epoch of maturity, the IASMS 

services, functions, and capabilities 

(SFCs) may need to evolve with 

an equal pace of innovation and 

technological advancement to 

address the increasingly complex 

AAM ecosystem envisioned over 

time. The purpose of the meeting 

was to identify requisite IASMS 

SFCs mapped to the different 

AAM ecosystem S-curve epochs 

necessary to enable in-time aviation 

safety. The session was introduced 

by Misty Davies, project manager 

of the System-Wide Safety (SWS) 

project, and kicked off with a 

presentation entitled “Evolution 

of IASMS SFCs in Transitions of 

Increasing Autonomy” presented by 

Kyle Ellis, deputy project manager 

of SWS. It was followed by a 

presentation entitled “Presentation 

of S-curve Diagram” presented by 

Parimal Kopardekar, director of 

the NASA Aeronautics Research 

Institute. The panel focused on 

transitions of IASMS across AAM, 

with panelists Parimal Kopardekar, 

Jon Hegranes (Founder and CEO, 

Kittyhawk), Eric Bergesen (Director 

7
8 AOSP NEWSLETTER // JUL-SEP 2021

TECHNICAL AND PROGRAMMATIC HIGHLIGHTS

of Operations, UPS Flight Forward) 

and moderated by Paul Krois 

of Crown Consulting, Inc. The 

presentation and panel session were 

very well received with more than 

100 virtual attendees. The session 

initiated a robust conversation 

highlighting the critical need to 

evolve the concept of IASMS to 

enable new entrant operations and 

advance the transformation of the 

National Airspace System. 

NASA ATD-2 Phase 3 Briefing 

to FAA/Industry Collaborative 

Decision-Making Teams 

POC: JEREMY COUPE AND GREG JURO

On July 29, NASA’s Airspace 

Technology Demonstration-2 

(ATD-2) team provided a briefing 

updating the status and results to 

date of the ATD-2 Phase 3 field 

demonstration in the North Texas 

area. The briefing was provided to 

the Collaborative Decision Making 

(CDM) stakeholders. CDM is 

a joint government/industry 

initiative aimed at improving air 

traffic flow management through 

increased information exchange 

amongst aviation community 

stakeholders. Two CDM teams 

(Surface CDM Team and Flow 

Evaluation Team) have a joint 

tasking to work with NASA to 

facilitate the transfer of ATD-2 

knowledge and technology. These 

two teams include representatives 

from most US air carriers 

(passenger and freight), business 

aviation, several major airports, and 

the FAA. The briefing focused on 

recurring operational uses cases 

that have provided Trajectory 

Option Set (TOS) opportunities 

for the airlines to reroute flights 

using the ATD-2 system during 

the Phase 3 field demonstration. 

Additionally, the briefing provided 

the opportunity to explain how 

the ATD-2 system operates in both 

the air traffic control and airline 

facilities. Each of the use cases 

were described in detail from an 

operational perspective focusing 

on the ATD-2 system’s capabilities 

to identify flights with potential 

for delay savings with a departure 

reroute. These delay savings benefits 

include off delay savings (earlier 

takeoff time), in delay savings 

(earlier arrival time on TOS route 

vs. filed route at destination) and 

aggregate delay savings (other 

flights obtaining delay savings 

as the result of the reroute). The 

briefing generated several questions 

and discussion on how the system 

could be used in other weather 

and traffic scenarios. Beneficial 

fuel and environmental savings 

metrics through July 26, 2021 were 

provided to the group for further 

review. The ATD-2 team received 

several compliments from CDM 

stakeholders on how efficiently the 

multi-partner, collaborative field 

demonstration has been managed 

in a live air traffic environment in 

the North Texas area. 

SWS Delivers Invited Briefings 

to JIMDAT on TASA 

POC: KYLE ELLIS, STEVE YOUNG, CHAD STEPHENS,

MICHAEL FEARY AND LANCE PRINZEL

On July 29, System-Wide Safety 

(SWS) project researchers provided 

invited briefings to the industry’s 

Joint Implementation Measurement 

Data Analysis Team (JIMDAT), 

a working group within the 

Commercial Aviation Safety Team 

(CAST). The briefings provided 

summaries of research completed 

under the NASA Technologies 

for Airplane State Awareness 

(TASA) subproject (2014-2019) 

within the SWS project. JIMDAT 

requested research findings and 

expertise regarding state-of-the-art 

and recommendations relevant to 

“safety enhancements” (SEs). Of 

particular interest is the CASTdefined SEs calling for Research and 

Development (SE-207/208, 210, 

and 211) that focused on developing 

new technologies and training 

methods to help mitigate the single 

largest commercial aviation accident 

category of loss-of-control inflight. 

NASA had previously briefed CAST 

in 2020, summarizing the completed 

SE research and development. 

JIMDAT was interested in next 

steps that should be considered to 

bring awareness of the research and 

technology accomplishments and 

encourage or facilitate transfer to 

industry. For the new technology 

aspects, NASA recommended 

that the research and development 
AOSP NEWSLETTER // JUL-SEP 2021 9

TECHNICAL AND PROGRAMMATIC HIGHLIGHTS

findings be the basis for new design 

SEs. This suggestion and other 

results of the JIMDAT meeting are 

to be briefed at an upcoming CAST 

plenary meeting in September. 

FSF Special Report Outlines 

Public Good Use Cases for 

SWS Development of IASMS 

POC: MISTY DAVIES AND KYLE ELLIS

In June 2021, the Flight Safety 

Foundation (FSF) published a 

special report entitled “Looking 

to the Future: Safety System 

Needs for Humanitarian UAS 

Operations” based on information 

gathered from a series of industry 

workshop engagements. In early 

August, supporting NASA’s SystemWide Safety (SWS) project, the 

FSF began organizing industry 

engagement to outline industry 

desires and current barriers to 

inclusion of unmanned aircraft 

systems vehicles in disaster and 

emergency response operations. The 

report outlines three operational 

use cases that are envisioned 

for inclusion in SWS’s Safety 

Demonstrator Series. The Safety 

Demonstrator Series is a set of 

spiral development research efforts 

and flight demonstrations focused 

on developing and maturing the InTime Aviation Safety Management 

System (IASMS) concept to 

manage risk and assure safety of 

operations. NASA’s concept of 

an IASMS is a scalable solution 

focused on safely integrating 

Advanced Air Mobility vehicles and 

concepts into operational use cases 

in the National Airspace System. 

The report can be viewed at: 

https://flightsafety.org/wp-content/

uploads/2021/07/D6-DMFRFINAL.pdf. 

UAM Airspace Research 

Roadmap Submitted for Export 

Control 

POC: IAN LEVITT

On Aug. 5, the Air Traffic 

Management – eXploration 

(ATM-X) project’s Urban Air 

Mobility (UAM) Airspace Research 

Roadmap (or, simply, Roadmap) 

was baselined at v1.0 and submitted 

for export control. The Roadmap 

is expected to be an important 

tool for the execution of ATM-X’s 

UAM airspace research over the 

next ten years, with the goal of 

evolving UAM airspace to UAM 

Maturity Level-4. It provides a basis 

for prioritizing and coordinating 

research efforts, and for integrating 

results that build toward NASA’s 

research goals. The Roadmap also 

has the potential to serve as a focal 

point for ongoing and continuous 

deliberation, as has been the case 

during its development. It naturally 

attracts questions and feedback 

that are beneficial to overall 

understanding, which is key to 

NASA’s leadership in defining the 

airspace of the future. 

SWS NASA Research 

Announcement Year Two MidYear Review Highlights 

POC: NATASHA NEOGI

On Aug. 11, the System-Wide Safety 

(SWS) project’s NASA Research 

Announcement topic, “Assuring 

Increasing Autonomous Systems with 

Non-Traditional Human-Machine 

Roles,” held its year two mid-year 

Review. The team from Pennsylvania 

State University presented a summary 

of their progress regarding the Urban 

Air Mobility (UAM) Concept of 

Operations and task modelling in 

the Working Models that Compute 

framework, with a specific focus 

on power/battery modelling. 

The subcontractor, Iowa State 

University, detailed their progress 

on integrating the systems theoretic 

process analysis methodology with 

traditional model-based systems 

engineering frameworks in order 

to enable a safety-forward systems 

engineering process. On Aug. 17, 

the team from Collins Aerospace 

presented their work related to 

modeling and verifying properties 

with respect to two specific UAM 

contingency scenarios by using the 

Architecture Analysis and Design 

Language modelling framework with 

the Assume Guarantee Reasoning 

Environment model checker. The 

subcontractors, Florida Institute 

of Technology and SoarTech, 

outlined their progress in modeling 

learning agents in the Soar cognitive 

architecture framework and verifying 
10 AOSP NEWSLETTER // JUL-SEP 2021

TECHNICAL AND PROGRAMMATIC HIGHLIGHTS

these agents in using the NuXMV 

model checker. Natasha Neogi, the 

NASA technical point of contact for 

these awards, arranged for each team 

to attend the others’ brief out leading 

to a lively red-team oriented question 

and answer environment. This 

enabled a vibrant exchange of ideas 

across both award efforts and has led 

to a complementary set of research 

being developed to address a wide 

range of human-machine teaming 

challenges in emerging technologies 

and operations. 

ATM-X Team Attends UAS 

BVLOS Operations Aviation 

Rulemaking Committee 

Meeting 

POC: JAEWOO JUNG

On Aug. 11 and 12, NASA’s Air 

Traffic Management – eXploration 

project was invited to observe 

the Unmanned Aircraft Systems 

(UAS) Beyond Visual Line of Sight 

(BVLOS) Operations Aviation 

Rulemaking Committee Plenary 

Sessions meeting. The UAS 

BVLOS Aviation Rulemaking 

Committee will provide 

recommendations to the FAA for 

performance-based regulatory 

requirements to normalize safe, 

scalable, economically viable, and 

environmentally advantageous 

UAS BVLOS operations that 

are not under positive air traffic 

control. This Aviation Rulemaking 

Committee will take a holistic 

approach in recommending a 

performance-based, technologyagnostic regulatory framework 

for BVLOS operations. NASA 

will continue to observe future 

meetings at Ames Research Center 

in California. 

ATM-X Holds Meetings with 

FlyOhio Project at the Ohio 

UAS Center 

POC: WILLIAM CHAN, KURT SWIERINGA, 

AND ROB FONG

Between July and August, the Air 

Traffic Management – eXploration 

(ATM-X) project held several 

meetings with representatives 

from the FlyOhio project, an 

initiative of the Ohio Unmanned 

Aircraft Systems (UAS) Center 

to incorporate multiple use cases 

for personal travel and delivery 

of goods across Ohio. On July 

14, the ATM-X project team met 

with the FlyOhio team to discuss 

potential research collaboration 

opportunities. The FlyOhio team 

has a multiyear program which 

lays out an innovative framework 

to design, test, and deploy a 

statewide Advanced Air Mobility 

(AAM) strategy focused on the 

movement of people and goods. As 

an action item, ATM-X project 

agreed to continue to discuss 

collaboration opportunities with 

FlyOhio to further the goals 

of the project. On July 23, the 

ATM-X project held a follow-up 

partnership meeting with the Ohio 

UAS Center, which is planning 

a series of flight demonstrations 

focused on Advanced Air Mobility 

and UAS cargo operations. The 

Ohio UAS Center and ATM-X 

project further discussed potential 

collaboration opportunities 

to advance the state of the art 

of National Airspace System 

integration. The technical team 

planned to work on collaboration 

details to be presented during a 

follow-on meeting for August. In 

an Aug. 13 meeting, the ATM-X 

project team and Pathfinding 

for Airspace with Autonomous 

Vehicles (PAAV) subproject met 

again with the Ohio Department 

of Transportation (ODOT) 

and Ohio UAS Center. Initial 

discussions with ODOT explored 

mutually beneficial collaborations 

between the PAAV effort and their 

planned demonstrations in the test 

environment. ATM-X and PAAV 

will continue follow-on discussions 

with ODOT to further the goals of 

the project. 

SWS Conduct Flight Tests 

Beginning in August to Test 

More than Twenty R&D SFCs 

POC: STEVE YOUNG AND MISTY DAVIES

Researchers in the System-Wide 

Safety (SWS) project will conduct 

a series of flight tests beginning in 

August and continuing through the 

autumn. Tests will utilize a small 

unmanned aircraft systems vehicle 

(Tarot-18), simulated air traffic, and 

an experimental air/ground system 
AOSP NEWSLETTER // JUL-SEP 2021 11

TECHNICAL AND PROGRAMMATIC HIGHLIGHTS

aimed at providing new services, 

functions, and capabilities (SFCs) 

that enable timely proactive safety 

management during operations. 

SWS-21 is the third of four flight 

test activities that have been planned 

over the FY18-24 timeframe and 

will be conducted on the City 

Environment Range Testing for 

Autonomous Integrated Navigation 

(CERTAIN) test ranges at NASA’s 

Langley Research Center in 

Virginia. As part of the air/ground 

system, more than 20 research and 

development SFCs will be tested, 

including some that make use of 

prototypical infrastructure such as 

those that may be available in urban 

settings in the future. Objectives of 

the testing are fourfold: 1) advance 

and assess the Technology Readiness 

Level of each SFC and the system 

architecture as a whole, including 

collecting data for the verification 

and validation of underlying models, 

software, and assumptions; 2) expose 

requirements for the design of future 

in-time safety management systems 

that may be tailored to specific usecases; 3) inform decisions regarding 

future project milestones including 

considering whether elements or 

aspects should be reconsidered, 

dropped, or added; and 4) advance 

test infrastructure capability in order 

to support planned future testing 

with SWS partners. Meeting these 

objectives will help to achieve more 

specific project milestones such 

as demonstrating techniques for 

automated in-flight risk assessment 

and mitigation. 

DIP Team Briefs RFI Response 

Summary Brief Out to 

Stakeholders

POC: MIRNA JOHNSON

This past quarter the Air Traffic 

Management – eXploration project’s 

Digital Information Platform (DIP) 

team conducted briefings on the 

results of a request for information 

(RFI) that was released Mar. 24. 

The first briefing was on July 29, in 

which the team met with Airlines 

for America to share a summary 

of information received from the 

RFI responses. The objective of 

that meeting was to follow up 

with the respondents’ takeaways 

and inform them of the concept 

and demonstration plans that 

were identified by the DIP team. 

The forum gave participants an 

opportunity to add on and provide 

additional feedback to the summary. 

It was clarified that the summary was 

an aggregate of responses and not 

a necessary consensus. Participants 

were looking forward to workshops 

to prioritize services and reach 

consensus to uniformly support the 

demonstrations. A key takeaway was 

the lack of input from airports in the 

responses. The DIP team intends 

to keep contacts with current and 

new airports for additional inputs. 

The presentation also described 

the roadmap for the collaborative 

demonstrations and next steps 

for partner engagement. The 

airline community was extremely 

receptive to follow up workshops 

for more detailed discussions. At 

a second meeting on Aug. 18, the 

team again shared with the DIP 

external community a summary of 

the information received from the 

RFI. More than 80 people attended 

the forum, which gave them an 

SWS-21 Test Vehicle (Tarot T18 Octocopter)
12 AOSP NEWSLETTER // JUL-SEP 2021

TECHNICAL AND PROGRAMMATIC HIGHLIGHTS

opportunity to ask questions, addon to, and provide feedback to 

the summary. The meeting helped 

describe next steps for partner 

engagement, including a series 

of workshops to be held through 

September and October. 

SWS Engagement with 

DRONERESPONDERS 

POC: KYLE ELLIS

On Aug. 20, System-Wide Safety 

(SWS) project leadership met 

with Charles Werner, director of 

DRONERESPONDERS Public 

Safety Alliance, to discuss collaboration opportunities in support of 

NASA’s Advanced Air Mobility 

mission. DRONERESPONDERS 

membership totals more than 900 

emergency and first responder agencies across the globe and has helped 

hundreds of operators successfully 

navigate the FAA waiver process to 

utilize unmanned aircraft systems 

for special governmental interest 

missions, including firefighting, 

search and rescue, law enforcement, utility/critical infrastructure 

restoration, post-disaster damage 

assessments, and media coverage 

for crucial public information. The 

DRONERESPONDERS community and expertise coupled with 

NASA’s In-Time Aviation Safety 

Management System research and 

development efforts pose a significant win-win opportunity to execute 

on NASA’s mission objectives and to 

expand unmanned aircraft systems 

operations for the public good. 

NASA and DRONERESPONDERS 

are seeking to establish an umbrella 

Space Act Agreement with an initial 

annex to support the SWS project’s 

Safety Demonstrator Series technical 

challenge. 

UAM Presents to the AAM 

Executive Board Airspace 

Working Group 

POC: MARIA CONSIGLIO AND VICTOR CARRENO

On Aug. 20, the Air Traffic 

Management – eXploration 

project’s Urban Air Mobility 

(UAM) Airspace Management 

subproject presented an abstract 

entitled “Potential of Detect 

and Avoid in the Flight Deck to 

Mitigate Collision Risk” to the 

Advanced Air Mobility Executive 

Board Airspace Working Group. 

This presentation described a series 

of studies conducted to explore 

the possible mitigation effects 

of Detect and Avoid in the flight 

deck through the analysis of a 

mid-air collision that occurred on 

August 16, 2015. Results from the 

study indicated that Detect and 

Avoid on the flight deck has the 

potential for virtually eliminating 

mid-air collisions, making them 

an extremely improbable event 

for general aviation. These 

results suggest that assistive 

Detect and Avoid technology 

could also be beneficial to UAM 

pilots operating in comparable 

conditions and under similar 

regulations. Additional research is 

needed to evaluate the potential 

risk mitigation impact of assistive 

Detect and Avoid technology for 

UAM traffic patterns as well as their 

interactions with Rules other Visual 

Flight traffic. UAM Separation 

Standards research will also include 

evaluations of appropriate wellclear configuration parameters for 

UAM operations throughout the 

incremental integration stages of 

the UAM Maturity Level scale. 

SWS TC-2 Level 2 Milestone 

Completion Reporting 

POC: STEVE YOUNG AND LYNNE MARTIN

On Aug. 30, the System-Wide 

Safety (SWS) project completed 

a level 2 milestone, TC2-02-02: 

“Development of techniques that 

(a) process state information and 

predictions about safety evolution 

in-time to determine best course 

of action, and then (b) select this 

action to mitigate selected risks.” 

This milestone has been successfully 

completed by developing four 

techniques for part (a) and three 

techniques for part (b). Furthermore, 

these have been applied within the 

overarching framework for InTime Aviation Safety Management 

System-based services, functions, 

and capabilities being investigated 

within the project. The exit 

criteria also included defining 

on-board contingency-selection 

logic and demonstrating this 

logic in simulation as part of 
AOSP NEWSLETTER // JUL-SEP 2021 13

TECHNICAL AND PROGRAMMATIC HIGHLIGHTS

deterministic decision-making 

and auto-mitigation functions 

for selected risks. Advancing the 

technology readiness level of each 

technique remains ongoing and 

includes flight testing across a span 

of representative use-cases and flight 

conditions and scenarios. These 

flight tests are the subject of future 

project milestones, including the 

FY22 Annual Performance Indicator. 

ATM-X Briefs at NASA/FAA 

Quarterly Meeting 

POC: MIKE MADSON

On Aug. 31 and Sept. 2, NASA’s 

Air Traffic Management – 

eXploration (ATM-X) team and 

the FAA held their latest quarterly 

review meeting. On Aug. 31, the 

Digital Information Platform 

subproject provided an update 

on their efforts to date. This was 

followed by the Extensible Traffic 

Management subproject, who 

presented the Research Transition 

Team ATM-X’s Upper Class E 

Traffic Management work and 

shared results from the two-day 

workshop held in July. On Sept. 

2, the Urban Air Mobility (UAM) 

Airspace Management subproject 

provided updates on the X4 

simulation, partners, and the UAM 

Airspace Roadmap. The Pathfinding 

for Airspace with Automated 

Vehicles subproject and Sky for All 

activities also presented updates on 

their respective ongoing work. 

SWS Presents at RTT 

Convening Authority Meeting 

POC: KYLE ELLIS AND MISTY DAVIES

On Sept. 2, the System-Wide Safety 

(SWS) project presented updates to 

the NASA/FAA Research Transition 

Team (RTT) Convening Authority 

regarding technology development 

and transfer of its In-Time Aviation 

Safety Management System (IASMS) 

concept. IASMS was presented as 

a scalable and tailorable solution 

to increasingly proactive risk 

management and safety assurance 

of both traditional and new entrant 

operations in the National Airspace 

System. The SWS RTT has four 

sub-groups within its RTT focused 

on addressing the safety challenges 

of transforming the National 

Airspace System, including an 

IASMS concept of operations group 

tasked with defining the near-term 

implementation and functionality 

of an IASMS to augment traditional 

aviation safety management systems. 

The IASMS concept represents a 

critical research and development 

effort to safely integrate Advanced 

Air Mobility vehicles and operations 

into the National Airspace System. 

ATM-X Participates in Aura 

Kickoff Meeting 

POC: RAFAEL APAZA

On Sept. 2, the Air Traffic 

Management – eXploration (ATM-X) 

project’s Urban Air Mobility (UAM) 

Communications, Navigation, and 

Surveillance (CNS) activity and 

AURA Network Systems hosted the 

Announcement of Collaborative 

Partnership Opportunities (ACO-3) 

CNS Annex Kickoff Meeting. 

Other participants included 

representatives from AURA Network 

Systems, Advanced Air Mobility 

(AAM) National Campaign, AAM 

Aeronautics Mission Integration 

Office, UAM CNS, and the 

Aeronautics Research Directorate 

at NASA’s Glenn Research Center 

in Cleveland. The NASA/AURA 

partnership has been established 

to flight test AURA’s air-ground 

communications system performance 

in a UAM-like operational 

environment. The kickoff meeting 

included NASA presentations from 

the ATM-X project and UAM 

subproject, CNS UAM architecture 

development, and NASA Glenn 

flight test capabilities and experience. 

AURA Network Systems presented 

information on their company 

background, a communications 

technology overview, previous work 

and their deployed communications 

system architecture. 

xTM Team Discusses ETM 

Research with Industry 

Member 

POC: JAEWOO JUNG

On Sept. 2, the Air Traffic 

Management – eXploration project 

team members discussed their 

Upper Class E Traffic Management 

(ETM) research with Andy 
14 AOSP NEWSLETTER // JUL-SEP 2021

TECHNICAL AND PROGRAMMATIC HIGHLIGHTS

Thurling, a principal of Thurling 

Aero Consulting LLC who is also 

associated with the High-Altitude 

Platform Station Alliance. The team 

discussed the research captured 

in two recent NASA ETM papers, 

“Define Minimum Safe Operational 

Volume for Aerial Vehicles in Upper 

Class E Airspace” with Min Xue as 

the first author and “Cooperative 

Upper Class E Airspace: Concept 

of Operations and Simulation 

Development for Operational 

Feasibility Assessment” with 

Hyo-sang Yoo as the first author. 

The group plans to continue 

research discussions as the ETM 

research and development advances. 

SWS Presents IASMS Concept 

to FAA UAM Strategic Working 

Group 

POC: KYLE ELLIS

On Sept. 2, Kyle Ellis, deputy project 

manager for NASA’s System-Wide 

Safety (SWS) project, provided an 

overview of the In-Time Aviation 

Safety Management System (IASMS) 

concept to the FAA’s Urban Air 

Mobility Strategic Working Group. 

The working group consisted 

of several thought leaders and 

experts from the FAA Air Traffic 

Operations (ATO) organization led 

by James Herrera. This interaction 

is important as it engages the FAA 

ATO organization, a key stakeholder 

whose input is critical to future 

development concepts for airspace 

management and safety, especially 

in pre-flight and in-flight phases 

of flight. Increased access to near 

real-time data and related processes 

is essential to the IASMS concept 

and its set of services, functions, and 

capabilities to be increasingly timely 

and proactive to monitor, assess, and 

mitigate risks. The IASMS concept 

was well received, and further 

collaboration between NASA and the 

FAA is currently being pursued across 

multiple lines of business, including 

FAA organizations ANG, AVS, and 

now ATO. This collaboration is 

essential to future implementation of 

IASMS concepts focused on enabling 

safe operations in a transformed 

national airspace system. 

SWS Kicks-Off Awards with 

Academic Partners 

POC: WENDY OKOLO

This past quarter, the SystemWide Safety (SWS) project kicked 

off new two research awards with 

academic partners. On Aug. 10, the 

SWS project team held a kickoff 

meeting with representatives from 

the University of Central Florida 

(UCF) to summarize and review 

plans for a new grant research 

agreement. The one-year research 

activity encompasses the design and 

development of a transfer learning 

approach that will improve battery 

health management and safety for 

unmanned air vehicles (UAVs). The 

goal of the effort is to improve the 

safety of UAVs through data-driven 

predictive analytics. The UCF team 

will: 1) develop a novel transfer 

learning approach for predicting the 

end-of-discharge voltage of lithiumion batteries of UAVs under varying 

flight plans and payloads with battery 

condition monitoring data including 

current, voltage, and temperature; 

and 2) validate the proposed transfer 

learning-based predictive modeling 

approach using the experimental 

data. This planned work 

complements ongoing research in 

the SWS project. During the kickoff 

meeting, guidance was provided 

on potential implementation and 

infusion points into SWS for the 

research developed under this 

research activity. 

On Sept. 2, the SWS project held 

a second kickoff meeting with a 

team from the University of Texas 

at Arlington. The purpose of the 

meeting was to summarize and 

review plans for a new research 

agreement grant. The one-year 

research activity will focus on 

the assessment and prediction of 

risks due to uncertainty in UAS 

flight performance parameters. A 

framework that combines varying 

uncertainty types and sources will 

be developed and utilized to assess 

which uncertainties pose the most 

pressing risks to UAS safety, thus 

providing guidance on safe UAS 

vehicle design and operations. A 

methodology for generating safety 

risk updates based on current 

knowledge of the National Airspace 

System as well as at a future instant 
AOSP NEWSLETTER // JUL-SEP 2021 15

TECHNICAL AND PROGRAMMATIC HIGHLIGHTS

to predict how the risk changes over 

time will be developed during the 

research. The methodologies will 

be validated using true historical 

data and simulated data. This 

planned work complements 

ongoing research in the SWS project, 

and during the kickoff meeting 

guidance was provided on potential 

implementation and infusion points 

into SWS for the research being 

developed under this research activity.

ATM-X PAAV Completes 

Communication Latency 

Simulation for Separation 

Assurance 

POC: MIWA HAYASHI

NASA has just renewed its Space 

Act Agreement (SAA) with General 

Electric (GE) to collaborate on 

software assurance for increasingly 

autonomous systems. The umbrella 

agreement is for five years, lasting 

through May 2026. The first 

three-year annex focuses on safety 

assurance research to broaden 

knowledge of operational risk 

assessment, evidence curation, and 

adaptive stress testing. The previous 

SAA between NASA and GE 

Global Research expired on May 

24. This agreement has increased 

the collaboration between NASA 

and GE. Some of the activities 

and accomplishments under this 

SAA included: (1) regular monthly 

meetings to review research needs 

and possible solutions; (2) successful 

technology transfer of a NASAdeveloped adaptive stress testing 

tool (AdaStress) to GE Aviation; (3) 

technology transfer of AdvoCATE, 

a NASA-developed tool to create 

and review safety cases; and (4) 

review of the Formal Requirements 

Elicitation Tool (FRET), a NASAdeveloped tool to elicit and 

formalize requirements for critical 

systems. The new agreement with 

GE enables NASA to work with all 

GE business units and builds on 

the past collaboration by applying, 

for example, the AdaStress tool to 

a flight management system and 

helping GE incorporate it into their 

production testing environment. 

NC and ATM-X UAM Meet with 

Wisk Aero 

POC: KEVIN WITZBERGER

On Sept. 3, representatives from 

the National Campaign (NC) and 

Urban Air Mobility (UAM) Airspace 

Management subprojects met with 

representatives from Wisk Aero. 

The purpose of the meeting was to 

discuss NASA’s terminal arrival and 

departure procedure designs, current 

traffic densities and patterns in the 

Dallas and Los Angeles metropolitan 

areas, and the NC-1 simulation 

(called X4) airspace corridor designs. 

Wisk Aero requested a meeting with 

NASA to discuss airspace details 

based on their conversations with 

NC staff during their regular NC-1 

flight test planning meetings and 

observations from the weekly X4 

airspace partner meetings. The 

meeting was interactive, as Wisk 

Aero showed a continued interest in 

gaining a deeper understanding of the 

designs for the terminal arrival and 

departure procedures as well as the 

airspace corridor design and rationale 

for the X4 simulation. A second 

meeting was requested and tentatively 

scheduled for Sept. 17. For a number 

of reasons, Wisk Aero is an important 

vehicle developer and participant in 

the NC-1 flight tests due to their 

desire to lean into partnering with 

multiple X4 airspace partners that are 

currently collaborating with NASA to 

develop their company’s Provider of 

UAM Services that will be tested in 

the X4 simulation effort. Following 

the simulation activity, Wisk Aero 

and multiple airspace providers will 

conduct a flight demonstration with 

an electric vertical takeoff and landing 

vehicle to assess the functional 

allocation and data exchanges needed 

for scalable UAM operations. 

NFLITE for UAM and AAM 

Accreditation Milestone 1 

Achieved 

POC: NELSON GUERREIRO

On Sept. 7, a key collaborative 

Inter-Agency Agreement milestone 

was reached by successfully 

demonstrating the NASA/

FAA Laboratory Integrated Test 

Environment (NFLITE). The Air 

Traffic Operations Laboratory at 

NASA’s Langley Research Center 

in Virginia and the FAA William 

J. Hughes Technical Center 
16 AOSP NEWSLETTER // JUL-SEP 2021

TECHNICAL AND PROGRAMMATIC HIGHLIGHTS

executed a test of integrated 

laboratory simulation capabilities 

demonstrating simulated Advanced 

Air Mobility operations including 

Urban Air Mobility (UAM) traffic, 

as well as unmanned aircraft 

systems traffic, in the presence of 

conventional traffic operations in 

the Atlantic City area. The milestone 

achieved was an accreditation test 

which validates the functionality 

of the associated integrated 

systems and is a formal process 

developed by the FAA to validate 

the interoperation of FAA systems 

with a partner’s external systems. 

The NFLITE activity brings 

together NASA prototype systems 

for Advanced Air Mobility and 

FAA operational systems to support 

research in the areas of concept 

validation, systems integration, 

human/automation interactions, 

other human factors areas, and 

autonomous systems, among others. 

NASA’s prototype capabilities 

used in the initial integration and 

accreditation included the UAM 

Vehicle Simulation, a six-degreesof-freedom electric vertical takeoff 

and landing piloted/automated 

aircraft simulation, the UAM 

Mission Planner for pre-departure 

trajectory planning of UAM 

missions, the UAM Vertiport 

Scheduler to vertiport resource 

management, and the Advanced 

Trajectory Services-Toolkit for 

Integrated Ground and Air Research 

capability for background traffic 

generation and scenario visualization. 

The FAA’s capabilities included 

the Target Generation Facility for 

simulated conventional operations, 

Simlat and ScanEagle products 

for simulated unmanned aircraft 

systems operations, a virtual tower 

view of airspace operations, and 

the Standard Terminal Automation 

Replacement System for airport 

terminal area air traffic controller 

displays. The accreditation scenario 

demonstrated potential Advanced 

Air Mobility operations using 

airspace suggested routings designed 

by FAA subject matter experts. 

ATM-X UAM Team Holds Meet- ings with Stakeholders to 

Develop Use Cases 

POC: SAVVY VERMA

On Aug. 4 and Sept. 8, the Air 

Traffic Management – eXploration 

project’s Urban Air Mobility (UAM) 

Airspace Management subproject 

team conducted the last two of four 

planned stakeholder meetings with 

the FAA and industry partner Joby 

Aviation. The objective of these 

meetings was to create a set of use 

cases in the Dallas/Fort Worth area 

to present and discuss with the FAA. 

This series of meetings will help 

to refine airspace and procedure 

concepts for UAM operations in 

the near term. FAA participants 

included personnel from NextGen, 

the Air Traffic Organization, and 

the Air Traffic Services organizations. 

This activity is seeking direct input 

from airspace experts in the form 

of group discussions focused on 

a series of UAM use cases that 

range from operations flying in 

Class E or G airspace that require 

little or no interaction with air 

traffic controllers to operations 

inside controlled airspace. Other 

topics of discussion were use cases 

related to repositioning a flight 

within controlled airspace, as well 

as handling a flight with an offnominal situation that led to its 

leaving controlled airspace and 

landing at a Class D airport. The 

last meeting was dedicated to 

discussing operations that would fly 

from downtown Dallas to Dallas/

Fort Worth International Airport 

utilizing the spine road. The usage 

of current day tools like letters 

of agreement to achieve UAM 

operations were also explored. 

The use cases cover a range of 

operational challenges and potential 

solutions. The results and lessons 

learned from these sessions will be 

used to identify research questions 

and upcoming simulation studies 

planned for the UAM Airspace 

Management subproject. 

NASA Participates in DARPA’s 

ARCOS Evaluation 

POC: MALLORY GRAYDON AND PAUL MINER

During Sept. 7-15, System-Wide 

Safety (SWS) project researchers 

Mallory Graydon, Paul Miner, and 

Natasha Neogi participated as subject 

matter experts in the government 

review of achievements in the 
AOSP NEWSLETTER // JUL-SEP 2021 17

TECHNICAL AND PROGRAMMATIC HIGHLIGHTS

Defense Advanced Research Projects 

Agency’s (DARPA’s) Automated 

Rapid Certification of Software 

(ARCOS) project. During the 

review, ARCOS project participants 

demonstrated assurance-case-related 

tooling that they are constructing. 

Graydon, Miner, and Neogi used 

their expertise in safety assessment 

and safety assurance to provide 

feedback that will help DARPA 

staff determine whether ARCOS is 

on track to deliver rapid, low-cost 

means to assess and assure the safety 

and security of high-consequence 

software systems following changes. 

While ARCOS aims to reduce the 

cost of certifying software-intensive 

military systems, the tools and 

techniques it develops may have 

applications to software used in 

aviation and spaceflight applications. 

The web-site for the ARCOS project 

is: https://www.darpa.mil/program/

automated-rapid-certification-ofsoftware

xTM Team Kicks-off ETM 

Market Study with LMI 

POC: JAEWOO JUNG

On Sept. 15, the Air Traffic 

Management – eXploration 

project’s Extensible Traffic 

Management (xTM) subproject 

team kicked off an Upper Class 

E Traffic Management (ETM) 

market study with LMI. This 

study has two objectives: (1) to 

elicit knowledge and information 

to understand current and future 

opportunities associated with 

high-altitude operations at scale 

and the risks and barriers for 

realizing those opportunities; and 

(2) to estimate the difference in 

high-altitude operations market 

size with and without the ETM 

system. The knowledge elicitation 

results are expected no later than 

four months after the contract 

award. A prototype high-altitude 

market model for the market-size 

estimation is to be delivered no 

later than eight months after the 

award, and the final report is to be 

delivered no later than 12 months 

after the award. Monthly status 

reports will be delivered to monitor 

the study’s progress. 

Sky for All Portal Evaluations 

POC: SHAWN ENGELLAND

On Sept. 17, the first round of 

evaluations for the Sky for All 

(S4A) portal closed. The S4A 

activity is part of the Air Traffic 

Management – eXploration project. 

Upon closing of the portal, all core 

team members were invited to 

provide feedback, and the S4A Core 

Team is currently testing the first 

draft of the portal, which includes 

mechanisms for providing feedback 

within the content. 

NASA Hosts ATD Project TIM 

POC: SHAWN ENGELLAND AND BARRY SULLIVAN

On Sept. 22 and 23, NASA’s 

Airspace Technology Demonstration 

(ATD) project conducted a virtual 

Technical Interchange Meeting 

(TIM) as part of the project’s 

closeout process. This online event, 

hosted by the NASA Aeronautics 

Research Institute, featured 

presentations and panel discussions 

that highlighted how the ATD-1, 

ATD-2, and ATD-3 demonstration 

activities have contributed to 

implementing the Next Generation 

Air Transportation System. The 

TIM focused on how the FAA and 

industry are utilizing the knowledge 

and technology developed and 

delivered under ATD. The TIM 

was kicked off with opening 

remarks from Robert Pearce, 

associate administrator of NASA’s 

Aeronautics Research Mission 

Directorate, and Pamela Whitley, 

assistant administrator of the FAA’s 

NextGen office. Following opening 

remarks, a project overview and 

history was presented. Following 

the history of the project, plenary 

sessions for “ATD-1 Trajectory 

Based Operations (TBO),” “ATD3 Traffic Aware Strategic Aircrew 

Requests (TASAR),” and “ATD-3 

Dynamic Routes for Arrivals in 

Weather (DRAW) and MultiFlight Common Route (MFCR)” 

were conducted on Sept. 22. The 

following day included opening 

comments from Akbar Sultan, 

director of AOSP, and Steve 

Bradford, chief scientist of the 

FAA’s Architecture and Nextgen 

Development. Subsequently, 

there were the featured panels 
18 AOSP NEWSLETTER // JUL-SEP 2021

TECHNICAL AND PROGRAMMATIC HIGHLIGHTS

“ATD-2 Single Airport Integrated 

Arrival Departure Surface (IADS)” 

focusing on the research conducted 

at Charlotte Douglas International 

Airport, “Multi-Airport Integrated 

Arrival Departure Surface (IADS)” 

focusing on the research conducted 

in the Dallas-Fort Worth metroplex, 

and the “ATD-2 Digital Services” 

session. For more information, 

visit: https://nari.arc.nasa.gov/

atd2021tim

ATM-X UAM Participates at 

Horizon UAM Symposium 2021 

POC: IAN LEVITT AND HANBONG LEE

The Air Traffic Management – 

eXploration (ATM-X) project’s 

Pathfinding for Airspace with 

Autonomous Vehicles (PAAV) 

subproject held a week-long 

tabletop walk-through of unmanned 

aircraft cargo scenarios with 

subject matter experts, including 

remote pilots, controllers, and 

dispatchers, from May 3-7. The goal 

of the tabletop walkthrough was to 

highlight shortfalls and gaps that 

prevent routine unmanned aircraft 

cargo operations in the National 

Airspace System within the current 

Air Traffic Control operating 

paradigm. A second concept of 

operations tabletop exercise was 

held virtually from June 14-18. This 

exercise was a continuation of the 

first tabletop held in May 2021, 

and new topics were discussed such 

as clearances, surface operations, 

launch and recovery, and increased 

automation considerations. The 

identified shortfalls from both 

tabletop exercises will be used to 

inform trade studies of possible 

near-term solutions as well as 

to inform possible automation 

solutions in the future. 

SWS Moderates AEWG 

Crosscutting WG Panel on ML/

AI and Autonomy Standards 

POC: MISTY DAVIES

On Sept. 23, the Advanced Air 

Mobility (AAM) Ecosystem 

Working Group’s (AEWG) 

Crosscutting Working Group 

hosted a panel on Machine 

Learning/Artificial Intelligence 

(ML/AI) and autonomy standards 

in aviation for the AAM 

community. Panelists included 

Kimberly Wasson, the autonomy 

assurance and certification lead 

at Joby Aviation; Darren Cofer, a 

fellow at Collins Aerospace; and 

Mark Roboff, co-founder and 

CEO of Sky Thread and the chair 

for the SAE G-34 Committee that 

is working new standards which 

may enable the use of ML/AI in 

aviation. The panelists reflected on 

the driving use cases that require 

ML/AI or autonomy in emerging 

aviation operations, discussed the 

likely scope of emerging standards 

in the near term, and talked about 

remaining gaps that will need to 

be researched to enable operations 

further in the future. Misty Davies, 

project manager of NASA’s SystemWide Safety project, moderated the 

panel. NASA subject-matter experts 

serve on the associated standards 

committees, including several key 

research personnel from SystemWide Safety. 

ATM-X Projects Presents X4 

Corridors at Joint Executive 

Board Working Group Meeting 

POC: SAVVY VERMA

On Sept. 23, the Air Traffic 

Management – eXploration 

(ATM-X) project’s Urban Air 

Mobility (UAM) Airspace 

Management subproject made a 

presentation to the joint NASA/

FAA Executive Board Working 

Group on the corridors designed 

for the upcoming X4 simulation. 

This activity is being led by the 

Airspace Procedures and Design 

(APD) team within the UAM 

Airspace Management subproject. 

The presentation highlighted how 

tactical separation will be managed 

by operators rather than air traffic 

controllers, by using a combination 

of software on the ground and onboard as well as equipment aboard 

the vehicles. The corridors designed 

for the X4 simulation, planned 

with National Campaign airspace 

industry partners, identified airspace 

in the Dallas/Fort Worth area that 

was de-conflicted from traditional 

traffic. The design utilized standard 

approach and departure procedures 

and historic track data to de-conflict 

the airspace from the traditional 
AOSP NEWSLETTER // JUL-SEP 2021 19

TECHNICAL AND PROGRAMMATIC HIGHLIGHTS

traffic so that Air Traffic Control did 

not have to intervene and provide 

services inside corridor airspace. The 

APD team also presented approach 

and departures procedures identified 

for the X4 simulation and a 

preliminary analysis of routes inside 

the corridor airspace. Both NASA 

and FAA participants provided 

feedback on the corridors that will 

be incorporated into the next series 

of simulations. Future work will 

involve further fine tuning of the 

airspace construct-corridors based 

on feedback from X4 simulation and 

data analysis.

ATM-X Presents PAAV and 

xTM Technical Challenges’s at 

TC Tollgate Meeting 

POC: WILLIAM CHAN

On Sept. 29, the Air Traffic 

Management – eXploration 

(ATM-X) project’s Pathfinding for 

Airspace with Autonomous Vehicles 

(PAAV) and Extensible Traffic 

Management (xTM) subprojects 

presented their revised technical 

challenges to the Aeronautics 

Research Mission Directorate’s Direct 

Program Management Council 

seeking subproject readiness approval. 

Overall, the projects did a good job 

in presenting the information and 

received approval to go forward and 

execute their plans. 

SWS Researchers Present 

AdvoCATE to Wisk Aero 

POC: GUILLAUME BRAT

On Sept. 29, System-Wide Safety 

(SWS) researchers Ewen Denney, 

Ganesh Pai, and Irfan Šljivo of 

the Robust Software Engineering 

technical area at NASA’s Ames 

Research Center in California 

provided a tool demonstration of 

the Assurance Case Automation 

Toolset (AdvoCATE) to system 

safety engineers and safety 

management system practitioners 

of Wisk Aero, a joint venture 

between the Boeing Company and 

Kitty Hawk Corporation. The tool 

demonstration covered a variety of 

AdvoCATE capabilities targeted at 

aviation safety case development 

– in particular: 1) the creation of 

hazard logs recording the results 

of preliminary and functional 

hazard analyses; 2) the capture of 

safety and assurance requirements 

corresponding to hazard mitigation 

mechanisms; 3) modeling of safety 

architectures to capture risk scenarios 

and architectural risk reduction 

measures; 4) assurance rationale 

capture through the development 

of structured arguments; and 5) 

evidence and tool modeling to 

record and manage assurance 

evidence and evidence generation 

mechanisms. The tool demonstration 

also presented several experimental 

features aimed at assurance case 

progress tracking and evaluation 

such as process dashboards, tabular 

views, and tool integration views. 

Afterwards, there was a discussion 

of safety assurance issues relating 

to both design and operational 

considerations for Urban Air 

Mobility and AdvoCATE support for 

the same, in which Wisk displayed 

interest. This may lead to a future 

follow-on discussion. 

IASMS Research Presented 

to NASA/FAA Associate 

Administrators 

POC: KYLE ELLIS

On Sept. 30, the System-Wide 

Safety (SWS) project presented key 

research activities being conducted in 

collaboration with American Airlines 

to associate administrators from 

NASA and the FAA. The presentation 

described recent developments 

toward a predictive and prognostic 

safety risk dashboard enabled by 

machine learning algorithms that will 

be demonstrated at American Airlines’ 

Integrated Operations Center. The 

presentation was given by Kyle Ellis, 

deputy project manager of NASA’s 

SWS project. The collaborative 

research with industry and the InTime Aviation Safety Management 

System (IASMS) concept were 

well received, with statements 

of support from FAA executive 

leadership. This engagement with 

FAA executives is of particular 

importance as it demonstrates a key 

technology transfer that addresses 

key industry needs to assess safety 

data and improve upon existing 
20 AOSP NEWSLETTER // JUL-SEP 2021

TECHNICAL AND PROGRAMMATIC HIGHLIGHTS

safety management system practices. 

FAA’s support of this effort presents 

an opportunity for establishing a 

new research safety enhancement 

with the Commercial Aviation 

Safety Team – a key step towards 

accelerating the development and 

integration of IASMS concepts by 

the aviation community at large. 

These collaborative and coordinated 

research efforts are essential to the 

transformation of safety management 

systems to be increasingly proactive 

and predictive – a necessary capability 

to enabling safe operations in a 

transformed national airspace system. 

SWS and NIST Formalize 

Collaboration on the 

Assurance of Automation 

POC: TERRY MORRIS AND ALWYN GOODLOE

On Sept. 30, a non-reimbursable 

Inter-Agency Agreement (IA1-35035) 

was executed between NASA’s 

Langley Research Center in Virginia 

and the Information Technology 

Laboratory of the National Institute 

of Standards and Technology (NIST). 

The agreement builds on existing 

collaboration efforts between the 

two organizations and relies on 

System-Wide Safety project expertise 

in the areas of software testing and 

formal methods. It streamlines 

cooperation and coordination in the 

areas of software verification and 

assured autonomy. NASA Langley 

and NIST focus on complementary 

areas of research in computing. For 

example, where Langley has a focus 

on the assurance of software for 

autonomous and highly automated 

aircraft, NIST focuses on the cloud 

and network infrastructure; visions 

of Advanced Air Mobility in an 

urban setting will require seamless 

operation between the two and 

requires closer coordination of 

research in these areas. In addition 

to regular meetings to coordinate 

research, regular visits are planned 

between the two organizations. 

NASA/JAXA Sign Research 

Agreement on Automation 

for Emergency Response 

Operations 

POC: JAEWOO JUNG

On Sept. 30, NASA and the Japan 

Aerospace Exploration Agency 

(JAXA) jointly signed a collaborative 

agreement to conduct research 

on automation for emergency 

response operations. The goal of 

the collaboration is to illustrate 

how disaster relief operations can 

be conducted in a more efficient 

manner by the combined use of 

conventional aircraft (e.g. helicopters), 

unmanned aircraft systems, and 

other Advanced Air Mobility aircraft. 

The first major milestone, due in 

December 2021, is to develop a plan 

that defines software requirements 

and specifications for software 

development and connectivity testing. 

ATM-X DIP Subproject 

Completes Initial Design 

Elements for CDDR 

POC: MIRNA JOHNSON

On Sept. 30, the Air Traffic 

Management – eXploration (ATM-X) 

project’s Digital Information 

Platform (DIP) subproject completed 

several technical design elements of 

the Collaborative Digital Departure 

Reroute (CDDR) service. The service 

will be evaluated and validated 

beginning in FY22 during the first 

demonstration in DIP’s Sustainable 

Aviation Demonstration series to 

take place at the NASA/FAA North 

Texas Research Station. The CDDR 

service has been designed to utilize a 

collection of new machine learning 

based services to provide near realtime predictions for airport surface 

models. The Airspace Technology 

Demonstration-2 approach provides 

these predictions as a single service 

and are now being redesigned and 

decoupled in the DIP subproject to 

work as independent services – a key 

DIP objective to enable greater use 

of machine learning-based services 

and to enable these modular services 

to serve as building blocks for more 

complex services in a transformed 

National Airspace System. This 

gives DIP a jumpstart in offering 

high-value reusable services for the 

community to leverage. 
AOSP NEWSLETTER // JUL-SEP 2021 21

RECOGNITION

Misty Davies Speaks at 

the NSF Summer Intensive 

Research Training Program 

POC: MISTY DAVIES

On July 9, Misty Davies, project 

manager of the System-Wide Safety 

project, spoke with undergraduate 

students that are participating 

in a special National Science 

Foundation Summer Intensive 

Research Internship Training 

Program hosted at the University 

of New Mexico. The goal of the 

program is to promote inclusive 

academic research environments 

by deliberately encouraging 

underrepresented students, and to 

encourage student participation 

in cyber-physical systems-related 

graduate programs or employment. 

AOSP Projects Participate at 

AIAA Aviation Conference 

POC: MISTY DAVIES, KYLE ELLIS, WILLIAM CHAN, 

JAEWOO JUNG AND KENNETH FREEMAN

From Aug. 2-6, both the SystemWide Safety (SWS) and Air Traffic 

Management – eXploration 

(ATM-X) projects participated 

and engaged in the AIAA Aviation 

Conference. The SWS project 

presented six papers on aviation 

safety topics, participated on 

panels, and contributed to technical 

committees. Of particular interest, 

SWS published a high-level 

engagement paper in the “In-Time 

Aviation Safety Management 

System: Defining Services, 

Functions, and Capabilities 

for an Advanced Air Mobility 

(AAM) In-Time Aviation Safety 

Management System (IASMS)” 

session and also published a paper 

with the evidence and results 

for this year’s Thrust 5 Agency 

Performance Indicator: “Uncertainty 

Quantification of Expected Timeof-Arrival in UAV Flight Trajectory.”

The ATM-X project was represented 

by several participants at the 

Aviation 2021 360 Forum. On 

Aug. 3, William Chan, project 

manager of ATM-X, described 

the innovative research being 

conducted in ATM-X during the 

panel session titled “Exploring 

NASA Aeronautics Innovations 

for Transforming Aviation.” Along 

with ATM-X, the panel consisted 

of representatives from the 

Advanced Air Mobility, Electrified 

Powertrain Flight Demonstration, 

Low Boom Flight Demonstration, 

Revolutionary Vertical Lift 

Technology, and Transformational 

Tools and Technologies projects. 

Also on Aug. 3, ATM-X subprojects 

Urban Air Mobility (UAM) and 

Extensible Traffic Management 

(xTM) presented their paper 

“Simulation and Modeling Concepts 

for Secure Airspace Operations.” 

Kenneth Freeman and Steve Garcia 

were invited to be panelists at the 

“Cyber Security and Information 

Assurance” session. On Aug. 6, 

the UAM Airspace Management 

subproject’s technical lead was a 

panelist for “Diversity and Inclusion 

in Next-Generation Airspace.” The 

xTM subproject team presented two 

Upper Class E Traffic Management 

papers. The first paper presented 

was “Define Minimum Safe 

Operational Volume for Aerial 

Vehicles in Upper Class E Airspace.” 

Min Xue, first author, presented a 

mathematical method to define the 

minimum safe operational boundary 

needed for operations in Upper 

Class E airspace with results from 

the experiments for verification of 

the proposed methods. The second 

paper presented was “Cooperative 

Upper Class E Airspace: Concept 

of Operations and Simulation 

Development for Operational 

Feasibility Assessment.” Lead author 

Hyo-sang Yoo presented an initial 

cooperative separation management 

concept for High Altitude Long 

Endurance uncrewed aircraft and 

described a prototype simulation 

platform for the visualization and 

assessment of the concept. The 

website for the conference is: 

https://www.aiaa.org/aviation

SWS Presents at UAS 

West Symposium 

POC: WENDY OKOLO

On Aug. 12, Wendy Okolo, associate 

project manager of the System-Wide 

Safety (SWS) project, presented 

“Transforming the National Airspace: 

A UAS Safety Perspective” at the 

Unmanned Aircraft Systems (UAS) 

West Symposium. She discussed 
22 AOSP NEWSLETTER // JUL-SEP 2021

RECOGNITION

current progress within the 

SWS project to address potential 

operational and design risks to safety 

in the National Airspace System 

(NAS) by developing In-Time 

System-Wide Safety Assurance 

services, functions, and capabilities. 

These are the building blocks of an 

In-Time Aviation Safety Monitoring 

System that will maintain NAS 

current safety levels with the 

inclusion of varying emerging 

operations with traditional airspace 

operations. The virtual UAS West 

symposium was held Aug. 11–13 and 

included 117 attendees. Among the 

attendees were industry, Department 

of Defense, and other government 

leaders who discussed technology, 

testing, evaluation, capabilities, 

and other UAS-related interests. 

SWS Researchers Publish 

Article to Flight Safety 

Foundations Magazine 

POC: NIKUNJ OZA, CHAD STEPHENS

AND KAITLYN FOX

NASA’s System-Wide Safety (SWS) 

project published an article in the 

August edition of the Flight Safety 

Foundation’s digital magazine 

AeroSafety World. Authored by 

NASA researchers Nikunj Oza and 

Chad Stephens, “Enabling Safety 

from Data: Machine Learning/

Artificial Intelligence for In-Time 

Aviation Safety” is the first in a 

series of articles that SWS plans 

to submit to AeroSafety World. 

Future topics include assurance 

of autonomy and the In-Time 

Aviation Safety Management System. 

Website: https://flightsafety.org/

asw-article/data-driven-safety/ 

SWS Project Researchers 

Present at the 2021 ISSC 

POC: TERRY MORRIS, MICHAEL HOLLOWAY

AND GUILLAUME BRAT

From Aug. 17-19, System-Wide 

Safety (SWS) researchers participated 

in the virtual 2021 International 

System Safety Conference (ISSC). 

Michael Holloway of NASA’s 

Langley Research Center in Virginia 

delivered a tutorial entitled “Arguing 

about Safety and Related Concepts” 

to participants. The tutorial, 

co-developed with Kimberly Wasson 

of Joby Aviation, was designed 

to enable participants to achieve 

five specific learning objectives 

including: 1) explain what an 

argument is and is not by listing the 

necessary and optional components 

of an argument, and explaining 

the difference between atomic and 

compound arguments; 2) expound 

on the meaning of this maxim: “you 

only need argument when you need 

argument;” 3) recognize common 

false or misleading statements about 

arguments regarding their use in 

safety analysis and assessment; 4) 

renounce preexisting notions about 

the uniqueness of “evidence;” and 

5) know where to look to explore 

the subject further based on initial 

feedback. Attendees believed these 

objectives were achieved. Particularly 

lively and interesting discussion 

arose in relation to objective 3, 

centering around the unfortunate 

ubiquity of the easily-refuted false 

claim by some critics that argumentbased approaches are especially 

susceptible to confirmation bias. 

Another SWS researcher, Guillaume 

Brat, presented a talk that covers 

research performed in the Robust 

Software Engineering (RSE) group 

for developing techniques and tools 

for the validation and verification 

for autonomous systems. The talk 

used the first useful guidance issued 

by the European Union Aviation 

Safety Agency (EASA) on the use 

of machine learning in aviation and 

showed that the RSE group has been 

on target and is addressing most of 

the issues identified by EASA. The 

work described ranges from dynamic 

safety cases to formal verification 

of deep neural networks including 

tools for formalizing and analyzing 

requirements, performing adaptive 

stress testing, using statistical 

technique to safely bound operations, 

and analyzing the resilience of 

complex autonomous systems. 

SWS Researcher Featured as 

NASA STEM Star by Office 

of STEM Engagement 

POC: GEORGE GOROSPE

On Aug. 18, a streaming YouTube 

presentation was released featuring 
AOSP NEWSLETTER // JUL-SEP 2021 23

RECOGNITION

Diagnostics and Prognostics 

Research Group member George 

Gorospe in the webcast entitled 

“Failure Is Not an Option 

with Robotics Expert George 

Gorospe.” The webcast was hosted 

by the NASA Office of STEM 

Engagement. The event provided 

insight into Gorospe’s Native 

American background, education, 

and journey to NASA. Gorospe 

also discussed his current research 

supporting NASA’s System-Wide 

Safety (SWS) project research 

and NASA’s interest in fostering 

students of all interests and 

majors to build a diverse future 

STEM workforce. The intended 

audience included students aged 

13+. George Gorospe has been a 

member of the Diagnostics and 

Prognostics research group since 

2013 and serves as the Systems 

Health, Analytics, Resilience, 

and Physics-modeling (SHARP) 

Laboratory Manager. NASA STEM 

Stars is a monthly web chat series 

that gives students ages 13+ the 

opportunity to connect with NASA 

Subject Matter Experts (SMEs). 

During the chat, students are 

encouraged to submit questions 

to be answered live by NASA 

SMEs. Each chat introduces 

a STEM career, addresses a 

STEM topic, or highlights a 

NASA mission. Each episode 

also highlights a STEM activity 

that students can do at home. 

AUVSI XPONENTIAL 2021 

Conference Features 

System-Wide Safety 

POC: WENDY OKOLO

On Aug. 19, Wendy Okolo, 

associate project manager of the 

System-Wide Safety (SWS) project, 

appeared as a panelist at the 

Association for Unmanned Vehicle 

Systems International (AUVSI) 

XPONENTIAL Conference in 

Atlanta. Entitled “Privacy, Security 

or Safety: Are They Mutually 

Exclusive?,” the panel discussed the 

technical, policy, and social impacts 

to privacy and security issues 

surrounding increased automation 

in the National Airspace 

System. Joined by other panelists 

Christopher Hill of The MITRE 

Corporation and Deven Desai of 

the Georgia Institute of Technology, 

Okolo addressed progressively 

autonomous unmanned 

vehicles and the associated 

safety implications for society. 

The AUVSI XPONENTIAL 

Conference reported 

approximately 5500 attendees. 

SWS APM interviewed on 

UAV Digest Podcast

POC: WENDY OKOLO

Wendy Okolo, associate project 

manager of the System-Wide Safety 

(SWS) project, was featured in 

the Aug. 27 episode of the UAV 

Digest, a weekly podcast that 

covers current news and other 

developments relating to unmanned 

aerial vehicles and systems (UAV/

UAS). Okolo chatted with the 

hosts, Max Flight and David 

Vanderhoff, about the SWS project, 

its goals, and achievements in 

developing an In-Time Aviation 

Safety Management System for 

the National Airspace System. The 

episode is available to stream at 

http://theuavdigest.com/380-nasasystem-wide-safety-project/, and 

was downloaded almost 900 times 

within the first few days. The 

UAV Digest podcast has presented 

commercial and recreational UAV/

UAS industry trends and other 

salient UAV/UAS information 

to a global audience since 2013. 

Other recent UAV Digest guests 

include representatives from 

Robotic Skies, MissionGO, 

NV5, and Iris Automation. 

SWS Provides Promotional 

Video to Support NASA’s 

AAM Safety Poster Contest 

POC: KYLE ELLIS

On Sept. 15, System-Wide 

Safety (SWS) project researchers 

contributed to NASA’s Advanced 

Air Mobility (AAM) mission, 

which organized a safety poster 

contest for students in grades 

6-12 in conjunction with the 

National Drone Safety Awareness 

Week hosted by the FAA. SWS 

contributed to the AAM safety 
24 AOSP NEWSLETTER // JUL-SEP 2021

RECOGNITION

poster contest formulation by 

outlining challenges for industry 

that need to be overcome to see 

AAM operations become a reality, 

and generated outreach content to 

gather student interest. A script was 

developed by Kaitlyn Fox, SWS 

communications specialist, and 

Kyle Ellis, SWS deputy project 

manager who recorded a requested 

video to enhance the outreach 

effort. The poster contest runs 

through Oct. 15, 2021: https://

www.nasa.gov/aeroresearch/aam/

aam-safety-poster-contest

SWS Presents on a Safety 

Critical Service at Institute 

of Navigation GNSS+ 

POC: EVAN DILL

On Sept. 22, Evan Dill of the 

System-Wide Safety (SWS) project 

presented a paper at the Institute 

of Navigation Global Navigation 

Satellite System (GNSS+) conference. His presentation covered the 

key developments for an In-Time 

Aviation Safety Management System 

(IASMS) service that models GPSquality based on multiple factors 

including vehicle location, altitude, 

and line-of-sight to GPS satellites 

regarding environment obscuration. This is a key service to determine safe operations of Advanced 

Air Mobility vehicles, especially in 

urban environments. This IASMS 

service is essential for mitigating 

risks related to position navigation 

and timing degradations such a 

vehicle navigation and contingency 

management automation. NASA is 

currently engaged in several Space 

Act Agreements and an Inter-Agency 

Agreement with the Department of 

Justice to further develop and demonstrate this safety critical service. 
National Aeronautics and Space Administration

Headquarters

300 E. Street, SW

Washington, DC 20024

www.nasa.gov/aeroresearch

www.nasa.gov