Expertise
Leadership, Acquisition, Mission Systems, Flight Testing, Education & Training, Air Transportability & Airdrop Technology, Program Management, Systems Engineering, Team Management
Profile
Mr. Mark Kuntavanish has over 40 years of federal service in Department of Defense (DoD) acquisition in the US Air Force (USAF) and US Army. He is recognized as a leading expert on cargo systems, parachutes, air transport, and airdrop for all US cargo aircraft, rotary wing, and V-22 craft with 30+ years in airdrop and air transport engineering and served 10 years as a wind tunnel test engineer, structures engineer, and system engineer. He has authored military standards for air transport and airdrop systems and created joint service transportation policies, as well as instructed airdrop and air transport classes and courseware on military handbook, MIL-HDBK-516, Section 20, Airworthiness of Aerial Delivery Equipment. Mark also created airworthiness standards for aeromedical equipment and personnel transport modules. He has served as chief systems engineer, chairman of Joint DoD Airdrop Group, lead engineer for integrated product teams (IPT), USAF representative to Joint DoD/Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) Transportation/Emergency Response Working Group, and lead engineer on multiple weapon system programs spanning development, production, and sustainment.
Significant Career Accomplishments
Led the Air Transportability Test Loading Activity (ATTLA)—a DoD-mandated office serving as the USAF proponent for air transport/airdrop, certifying aircraft and cargo systems; team certified over 3,000 cargo in support of critical military, humanitarian relief, and special operations missions, including: support of the global war on terror (GWOT); disaster relief for hurricanes Sandy, Harvey, Irma and Maria; transport of French combat equipment to Mali; certification of new cargo pallet; and expanded aerial delivery interoperability capabilities with allied partners.
Architect in design and fielding of Negatively Pressurized Conex (NPC) and NPC Lite (NPCL) transport modules in 85 days to meet DoD goal of air transporting up to 3,000 Covid patients daily and served on Operation Warp Speed to define transportation and distribution of Covid vaccines.
Authored Military Standard, MIL-STD-1791, the interface standard for designing cargo and aerial delivery systems and received the 2014 DoD Standardization Award.
Authored update to Section 20 of MIL-HDBK-516, Airworthiness Certification, and served as instructor for the Air Force Institute of Technology (AFIT) airworthiness class.
Led effort to successfully achieve C-27J military flight release (MFR) by combining airworthiness certificates from the European Union Aviation Safety Agency (EASA), Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), US Army, and USAF; the MFR allowed the aircraft to rapidly deploy to Afghanistan six months early.
Revamped systems specifications for the KC-46 source selection request for proposal (RFP) and reevaluated requirements for advanced deployment team and replaced incompatible equipment on the deployment package list.
Established air transport/airdrop standards and airworthiness processes for all cargo, aeromedical equipment, and personnel airdrop on cargo/tanker aircraft and co-developed airworthiness requirements, joint service standards, and qualification procedures for aeromedical equipment.
Key Positions
Team Lead, Air Transportability Test Loading Activity, Air Force Life Cycle Management Center, Flight Systems Engineering Division (AFLCMC/EZF)
Lead, Systems Engineering, C-27J Program (ASC/WLVE)
Aerospace Engineer, KC-X Tanker Program (AESG/SYEF)
Structures Engineer, C-17 (516 AES Gp/ENF)
Aerospace Engineer, ATTLA (ASC/ENFC)
Education
MS, Management Science, University of Dayton
BS, Aerospace Engineering, University of Notre Dame
