Under the auspices of the United States’ Air Force’s (USAF) AFWERX innovation initiative, on May 8th the California-based AAM startup MightyFly conducted a live flight demonstration of its flagship Cento autonomous eVTOL platform for service officials at San Joaquin County’s New Jerusalem Airport.
As part of AFWERX’s ongoing work to assess the operational prospects for the use of eVTOL platforms in a range of military contexts ranging from transportation and surveillance to medical evacuation, MightyFly was awarded a Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Phase II contract to explore the potential of its Cento platform and associated Autonomous Load Mastering System (ALMS) to be deployed for the fulfillment of military cargo requirements. The May demonstration was designed as a mission in miniature, tasking the Cento with performing package retrieval, transport and delivery.
The Cento is powered by eight hybrid-electric VTOL propeller and one larger push propeller. The carbon fiber fuselage can be opened from the rear to host cargo, with the aircraft featuring a reported takeoff weight of 249 kilograms (550 lb) and a cruising speed of 240 km/h (150mph).
