A recent agreement between New Mexico State University and the Federal Aviation Administration is taking wing to increase and commercialize testing at the university’s Unmanned Aircraft Systems Flight Test Center.
The program helps define how unmanned aircraft systems or UAS, also known as unmanned aerial vehicles or UAV, will be safely flown and integrated into airspace that is already occupied by other aircraft, said Dennis Zaklan, deputy director of NMSU’s flight test center. And it bodes well for government entities, researchers, private businesses as well as the agriculture industry, he said.
The boost came when the FAA changed its Cooperative Research and Development Agreement, in place since 2007, to an Other Transaction Agreement for the operation of the flight test center. The site was also recently recognized as a member of the FAA Center of Excellence, a mark which other industry leaders say is yet another boost to the aerospace industry in southern New Mexico.
“PSL has evolved technical expertise in UAV operations over a long period of time. They have test capability second to none,” said Pat Hynes, executive director of the New Mexico Spacegrant Consortium. “It is not enough to know what to do with drones, it is also necessary to know the barriers the industry faces as we grow demand for this technology. NMSU’s PSL has experience in air traffic management that has enabled them to understand how to develop our unique programs here, and to invest with a strategic perspective. Which led to them being selected as a member of the FAA Center of Excellence. Their experience is robust.”
The change in designation, Zaklan explains, improves on the former agreement which limited the data collected during tests at the center to be shared only as test data with the FAA. The new agreement allows the NMSU center, one of six approved as test sites under the new agreement, to operate commercially and attract customers.
“The OTA allows these test sites to sell their services while providing the FAA with information,” he said. “The other thing it allows is … under OTA we can get FAA contracts.”
The bulk of the work done at the center is getting drones into the national airspace system safely.
“Our primary focus was not on the educational aspects of (Unmanned Aerial Systems),” Zaklan said. “We didn’t go out of our way to advertise that we trained pilots. One, the FAA hadn’t determined requirements for pilots and, two, we were looking at how to operate unmanned aircraft (sharing airspace) with manned aircraft safely.”
NMSU’s UAS FTC was established to provide a unique flight test capability for civil, commercial and public aircraft as well as payload and technology manufacturers, integrators, researchers and regulators to flight-test unmanned aircraft systems in 15,000 square miles of mixed-use airspace under a variety of conditions in central and southern New Mexico.
The airspace assigned to NMSU borders White Sands Missile Range, other Department of Defense airspace, as well as Spaceport America’s location.
“NMSU’s UAS FTC is pleased to be extending our formal relationship with the FAA into a second decade under this new agreement,” said Steve Hottman, director of the NMSU UAS FTC. “We look forward to building on our past successes and to continue our positive contributions to supporting the FAA’s safe integration of UAS into the National Airspace System.”
After determining how to safely plan flights and alert other airspace users to their presence, businesses and government entities are using unmanned craft for everything from evaluating crop production to maximize yield and inspect the stability of pit mines to inspecting major infrastructure. The United State Bureau of Reclamation is in negotiations to use unmanned vehicles for the first time to inspect a multi-pour dam, in this case, Elephant Butte.
In addition, a Romanian company, which is registering in the United States, is working with the city to start a business building medium-sized drones and use the local test area.
But safety, and reliable testing, remain a challenge in the ever-expanding drone market, Zaklan said. Unmanned Aerial Systems “are expanding so fast it’s dangerous,” he said. “Our goal is to help the FAA come up with some standards. With technology changing, it’s going to be ever-changing.”
But the future holds the promise of UAS transporting goods and, someday even passengers. “The future? I will not get on an aircraft that does not have a pilot,” Zaklan said. “My kid may or may not get on that aircraft without a pilot. However, his children most assuredly will.”
Article by Jason Gibbs, courtesy of the Las Cruces Sun-News.
