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 Featured Sols 4214–4215: The Best Laid Plans...3 min readSols 4214–4215: The Best Laid Plans...article4 days ago Hubble Observes a Cosmic Fossil2 min readHubble Observes a Cosmic Fossilarticle3 days ago Voyager 1 Returning Science Data From All Four Instruments2 min readVoyager 1 Returning Science Data From All Four Instrumentsarticle4 days ago
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 Highlights A large propeller plane takes off from a runway, surrounded by brown and green grasses with low buildings out of focus in the background. The plane is white with a blue stripe down the middle, and has a NASA logo on the tail. The sky is a hazy blue with some clouds.

	2 min read

		NASA-Led Mission to Map Air Pollution Over Both U.S. Coasts

		article

			3 days ago Students watch a sounding rocket launch at sunrise.

	4 min read

		NASA’s Wallops Flight Facility to Launch Student Experiments

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			3 days ago NASA’s Hubble Restarts Science in New Pointing Mode

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		NASA’s Hubble Restarts Science in New Pointing Mode

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			3 days ago
 Highlights A woman with long, wavy hair and a bright smile sits at a round table during a formal event, surrounded by other attendees. She is wearing a brown cardigan and a patterned blouse.

	5 min read

		Lakita Lowe: Leading Space Commercialization Innovations and Fostering STEM Engagement

		article

			5 days ago NASA’s Repository Supports Research of Commercial Astronaut Health

	2 min read

		NASA’s Repository Supports Research of Commercial Astronaut Health

		article

			6 days ago NASA astronaut Doug “Wheels” Wheelock and Axiom Space astronaut Peggy Whitson prepare for a test of full-scale mockups of spacesuits developed by Axiom Space and SpaceX’s Starship human landing system developed for NASA’s Artemis missions to the Moon.

	4 min read

		NASA Astronauts Practice Next Giant Leap for Artemis

		article

			2 weeks ago
 Highlights A large propeller plane takes off from a runway, surrounded by brown and green grasses with low buildings out of focus in the background. The plane is white with a blue stripe down the middle, and has a NASA logo on the tail. The sky is a hazy blue with some clouds.

	2 min read

		NASA-Led Mission to Map Air Pollution Over Both U.S. Coasts

		article

			3 days ago NASA Announces New System to Aid Disaster Response

	4 min read

		NASA Announces New System to Aid Disaster Response

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			4 days ago Amendment 21: A.3 Ocean Biology and Biogeochemistry: NSPIRES cover page issue and Delay of Proposal Due Date

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		Amendment 21: A.3 Ocean Biology and Biogeochemistry: NSPIRES cover page issue and Delay of Proposal Due Date

		article

			5 days ago
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		NASA’s LRO Spots China’s Chang’e 6 Spacecraft on Lunar Far Side

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			3 days ago The Next Full Moon is the Strawberry Moon

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		The Next Full Moon is the Strawberry Moon

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			4 days ago Mars Dunes

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			4 days ago
 Featured Hubble Observes a Cosmic Fossil

	2 min read

		Hubble Observes a Cosmic Fossil

		article

			3 days ago WL20 group of stars is located in the Rho Ophiuchi star-forming region

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			3 days ago Voyager 1 Returning Science Data From All Four Instruments

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		Voyager 1 Returning Science Data From All Four Instruments

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 Highlights A silver-colored airplane research model sits in a wind tunnel facility. The model consists of a section of a scaled-down fuselage on the floor, with a single wing mounted vertically on it. The metallic wall of the wind tunnel is visible in the background.

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		Globetrotting NASA Research Model Increases Accuracy

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			2 weeks ago Team “Rumble Ready” from California State Polytechnic University, Pomona, comprised of (from left to right) Professor Mark Gonda, Nicole Xie, Junaid Bodla, Jordan Ragsac, Krishi Gajjar, Gerald McAllister III, and Leara Dominguez, took home first place at the 2024 Gateways to Blue Skies Forum held May 30-31 at NASA Ames Research Center. They are standing in a row posing for the photo; the team members are wearing blue t-shirts, black pants, and tennis shoes.

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			5 days ago Ed Stone, former director of JPL and project scientist for the Voyager mission, died on June 9, 2024. A friend, mentor, and colleague to many, he was known for his straightforward leadership and commitment to communicating with the public.

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 Featured A team from Iowa accepts its Artemis grand prize award during NASA’s Lunabotics competition on Friday, May 17, 2024, at the Center for Space Education near the Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex in Florida.

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			3 days ago A large propeller plane takes off from a runway, surrounded by brown and green grasses with low buildings out of focus in the background. The plane is white with a blue stripe down the middle, and has a NASA logo on the tail. The sky is a hazy blue with some clouds.

	2 min read

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 Highlights NASA Astronaut Official Portrait Frank Rubio

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5 min read Flight Simulators Help Enable Urban Flights


NASA
 A participant flies through a simulated downtown environment using software designed by NASA and the Adaptive Aerospace Group.
NASA
 City skies in the not-so-distant future will start to come alive as air taxis and drones zip around delivering people and goods faster than ever. Many of these new aircraft in the future sky will have the ability to take off from landing pads on tall buildings and land on another, much like a helicopter, but with the added ability to transition to forward flight like that of an airplane—all while being powered electrically. These novel electric vertical take-off and landing (eVTOL) aircraft being developed by the aerospace industry are likely to have new features and capabilities enabled by this electric propulsion that have not been previously certified by the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA). Furthermore, these features are likely to be managed through electronic flight controls, known as fly-by-wire, which in many cases have new integrated protections and control functions designed to provide safe and predictable control responses for the pilot throughout the flight of these unique aircraft. NASA’s Langley Research Center in Hampton, Virginia, and the Adaptive Aerospace Group (AAG) recently completed a round of evaluations and demonstrations for the FAA and the United States Air Force (USAF) using advanced simulators for the Fly-By-Wire Mission Task Element Development and Certification (FlyTEC) study. “The goal of the effort is to develop candidate flight-test tasks, known as mission task elements (MTE).” said Kenneth Goodrich, deputy project manager for technology for the Advanced Air Mobility (AAM) project. “These MTEs can be used in flight tests and piloted-simulations to assess whether an aircraft’s response to the pilot’s primary control inputs safely meet the intent of the FAA’s certification requirements.” The MTEs developed were evaluated using an eVTOL simulation model AAG developed that is representative of NASA’s Revolutionary Vertical Lift (RVLT) project’s Lift + Cruise configuration. The flight control concept was developed to make the vertical takeoff and landing part of a VTOL aircraft easier to manage than a conventional helicopter. NASA Langley and the AAM Project contributed the entry into the Flight Simulation Facilities (FSF) which provide real-time, high-fidelity, full-mission, human-in-the-loop capabilities to replicate the control systems of air and space vehicles as accurately as possible. A simulated flight environment designed by NASA and the Adaptive Aerospace Group. Pilots flew through a simulated downtown New York City.
NASA
  “Our mission is to accelerate the development and commercialization of eVTOL aircraft by creating more effective linkages between the vehicle development, certification and operational regulation communities so that operational concerns and considerations can be more effectively identified and integrated into the vehicle certification process,” said Goodrich. Members of the FAA’s Aircraft Certification, Compliance, and Airworthiness Division defined the goals of the study under an interagency agreement with NASA, and a contract with AAG to develop candidate MTEs and a simulation model, based on a reference configuration developed by NASA’s RVLT project, and the candidate set of MTEs for advanced eVTOL aircraft. In March, the MTEs developed using the simulation were evaluated by the FAA. Their goal of having a candidate set of MTEs, learning how to apply them and what to look for was met. They also realized the simulation model and facility offered a great opportunity to give the FAA Flight Standards Service (FSS) branch experience with the type of vehicles they are being asked to certify. FSS personnel visited Langley in May to gain first-hand experience with the high-fidelity simulation of eVTOL aircraft with fly-by-wire implementation while conducting representative flight tasks. The FSS manages several areas of policy critical to the introduction of commercial UAM operations. These areas include pilot training and licensing, flight procedures and operations, and approval and oversight of future air taxi operators who will fly these passenger service aircraft. NASA and the FAA also invited U.S. Air Force Col. Frederick “Stryker” Haley to Langley Research Center. Haley is developing training syllabi for USAF eVOTL aircraft that can be used for search and rescue, logistics support, and security. Their goal is to enable vehicle piloting by Airmen who aren’t traditional pilots but are enabled by aircraft with sophisticated automation support. Over the course of the study, nine FAA and five Air Force representatives, including test pilots and policy makers, reviewed the immediate and long-term challenges that increasingly automated eVTOL aircraft present to the agencies. They were then given individual familiarization flights in the simulator. This included an introduction to piloting the aircraft in powered-lift, transition and wing-borne flight modes and conducting basic flight maneuvers and operations. Once their basic flight skills with the eVTOL aircraft were developed, they conducted representative UAM flights in a simulation of the New York City area, including routes between Newark International Airport and heliports situated on rooftops and piers. In addition to the demonstrations in the FSF, the event also included demonstrations of two portable fixed-based simulators at an offsite location. These simulators, developed by Flight Level Engineering under contracts funded by the FAA and NASA, demonstrated additional eVTOL cockpit concepts and gave participants a broader exposure to both near-term and more futuristic aircraft automation and pilot-vehicle interface concepts. “These demonstrations directly support the development of a more comprehensive suite of integrated aircraft-automation and pilot-vehicle interface concepts, and supporting system standards, that enable improved AMM operational capabilities,” said Goodrich. “The effort is also helping to simplify the process of becoming a pilot by reducing training time and costs and help make AAM aircraft more accessible.” The candidate MTEs evaluated in Langley’s simulators will proceed to inform a follow-on study supported by the FAA to be conducted in NASA Ames Research Center’s Vertical Motion Simulator. @NASA @NASAaero @NASA_es
 @NASA @NASAaero @NASA_es
 @NASA @NASAaero @NASA_es
 @NASA


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				Last Updated
					Jul 26, 2023
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