USAF Approves Merlin’s Airworthiness Plan for Autonomous KC-135
Inflight refueling aircraft slated for first autonomous flight in 2025
By Hanneke Weitering
The U.S. Air Force has accepted Merlin’s airworthiness plan for a Boeing KC-135 Stratotanker retrofitted with its autonomous flight control system, called Merlin Pilot. Announcing the news on November 12, the Boston-based company said it aims to begin flight demonstrations with the Merlin Pilot-equipped KC-135 inflight refueling platform in 2025.
Merlin’s airworthiness plan outlines its approach to obtaining and maintaining military airworthiness approval for the Merlin Pilot KC-135, which the company is developing in collaboration with the U.S. Air Force’s Air Mobility Command and Air Force Materiel Command. Meanwhile, the company is working with the U.S. Special Operations Command to automate the C-130J Super Hercules transport aircraft.
“We’re building the Merlin Pilot to not just meet safety standards, but redefine them. Integrating the Merlin Pilot onto one of most important aircraft in the USAF’s fleet is crucial to advancing military aviation into a new era of pilot efficiency and national security, as well as progressing autonomy at scale,” said Merlin founder and CEO Matt George.
The Merlin Pilot combines advanced autopilot and navigation technologies with artificial intelligence-driven natural language processing capabilities, allowing the system to communicate verbally with air traffic control just like a human pilot.
Early Operations Maintain a ‘Pilot in the Loop’
While Merlin’s ultimate goal is to enable fully autonomous flights with no crew on board, it plans to first offer the system as a pilot aid, alleviating pilot workload and enabling reduced-crew or single-pilot operations in both military and civilian airplanes.
On the commercial side, Merlin plans to make the “drop-in autonomy kit” available for retrofit under supplemental type certificates for a variety of legacy aircraft, including the Cessna Grand Caravan and Beechcraft King Air. It recently partnered with Honeywell to integrate its autonomous flight technology with the Honeywell Anthem avionics suite.
In September, Merlin launched a flight test campaign with its first “certification-ready” Merlin Pilot-equipped Cessna Caravan. According to Merlin, that flight test campaign will culminate in an FAA supplemental type certificate that the company can use as a basis to integrate the Merlin Pilot into other Part 23 aircraft.
