AFWERX Airworthiness Test and Safety Lead Hank “HOG” Griffiths flies BETA’s simulator in preparation for the test flight mission. (BETA Technologies photo/Brian Jenkins)
USAF and BETA Technologies make history with the first manned flight of an electric aircraft.
Dayton Aerospace congratulates AFWERX and the Agility Prime team on their most recent, groundbreaking milestone. On 9 March 2022, US Air Force (USAF) pilots were the first-ever Airmen to fly an electric aircraft with a military airworthiness certification―BETA Technologies’ electric vertical takeoff and landing (eVTOL) aircraft, ALIA. This historical flight follows the very first USAF airworthiness approval for an electric aircraft with personnel on board in 2021.
Dayton Aerospace is proud to be an important part of the Agility Prime team, providing expert airworthiness support of this non-traditional USAF program―an effort certain to have game-changing impacts on the Department of Defense (DoD) and commercial marketplace.
Read more about this pioneering milestone here and visit the links at right to get more information on the Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL), AFWERX, and the Agility Prime program.