AFWERX Agility Prime completes first USAF-piloted flight of an eVTOL vehicle with partner Kitty Hawk

The AFWERX Agility Prime program took another step forward in December with the first government remotely piloted flight of an electric Vertical Takeoff and Landing, or eVTOL, aircraft. 

Capt. Terrence McKenna, an Air Force Reserve pilot with the 370th Flight Test Squadron and the Test and Experimentation Lead for AFWERX Agility Prime, participated in remote pilot in control, or rPIC, training on the Heaviside aicraft at the Kitty Hawk Corporation's facility in Palo Alto, California from Dec. 13-17, 2021.

The training culminated in the first government remote piloted flight of an eVTOL aircraft when he successfully flew the Heaviside via the Buddy Box System. The first Airman flight demonstrated another key milestone in the collaboration. 

Kitty Hawk, in partnership with Agility Prime, is evaluating a training syllabus for their unmanned eVTOL aircraft, the Heaviside. McKenna's 15-plus years of experience piloting manned aircraft such as the C-5 Galaxy and the T-38 Talon, as well as designing, developing, and testing manned and small unmanned aircraft systems, or sUAS, as a civilian engineer, assisted Kitty Hawk's team of engineers in refining both their product and their training procedures.