Delivering Emergency Supplies for Humanitarian Relief
AYR Logistics signed an agreement with Elroy Air to purchase up to 100 Chaparral aircraft to augment and expand its humanitarian logistics business. AYR Logistics is an aircraft owner and operator with over 20 years of experience providing logistics support to the humanitarian community in over 45 countries including the United Nations, World Food Program (WFP), governments and NGOs.
“What aid agencies spend on transportation is money that they’re not spending on food, medicine and other emergency supplies, but transportation is obviously very important to get the aid to where it needs to be,” said Stephen Lyons, chief development officer of AYR Logistics. “Moving to unmanned, aerial cargo vehicles will make a huge difference to our cost structure and the risk profile of our operations. We fly in difficult terrain and difficult conditions. We don’t always have the luxury of a runway or even personnel at some locations. There simply hasn’t been a UAV with the type of capabilities that the Chaparral has in the commercial markets. The Chaparral is a quantum leap in terms of load carrying and range, as well as being able to operate with minimal infrastructure.”
“We have designed an aircraft that behaves like a hybrid between a rough-and-ready helicopter and a battle-hardened bush plane, that can pick up cargo anywhere with a 50-square- foot landing area,” said Clint Cope, co-founder and president of Elroy Air. “The Chaparral will be a vital logistics link for people around the world with unreliable roadways, and in remote and rural areas that take longer to reach today.”
An early prototype of the Chaparral was flown in 2019, demonstrating several key systems of the aircraft design. The Chaparral system unveiled today features eight vertical-lift fans, four distributed electric propulsors for forward flight, a high- wing airframe configuration, and improved ground autonomy and cargo-handling systems.
The Chaparral is a transitioning “lift + cruise” VTOL aircraft with a full carbon composite airframe and a turbine-based, hybrid- electric power train for long-range mission capabilities. It was also designed to fit in a 40-foot shipping container or C-130 cargo aircraft, enabling it to be quickly shipped and deployed anywhere in the world.
Elroy Air has developed lightweight, aerodynamic modular cargo pods that can be preloaded by ground personnel and picked up by the aircraft before takeoff. At the delivery location, the cargo pod is lowered to the ground and released after the system has landed. The Chaparral system can retrieve another prepacked pod and transport the pod to its next destination, creating a bidirectional conveyor belt through the sky.
Bell Completes Successful Demonstration
for NASA SIO
Extension in Collaboration with Hillwood and Northwest ISD
Bell Textron Inc. recently announced the Autonomous Pod Transport’s (APT) successful demonstration of a ground-based Detect and Avoid (DAA) flight, fulfilling an extension for its NASA systems integration and operationalization (SIO) project. The APT DAA demonstration showcased the aircraft’s ground radar system integration and its capabilities when navigating airspace traffic and requirements, a critical component
needed for future Advanced Air Mobility (AAM) vehicles.
The objective of the SIO demonstration was to execute a beyond-visual-line-of-sight mission in complex airspace utilizing DAA technology to monitor airspace for “natural intruders” using Bell’s 429 commercial helicopter and APT unmanned aircraft. Bell’s QuantiFLYTM system, a new aircraft communication unit (ACU) powered by Truth Data, was used on the Bell 429 to record aircraft telemetry data. The QuantiFLYTM system offers a true low-cost, lightweight, and fully automatic flight data monitoring (FDM) solution,
“We are excited to demonstrate the effectiveness of ground- based monitoring solutions as part of UAS infrastructure,” said Matt Holvey, director of Intelligent Systems at Bell. “Radar monitoring, whether airborne or ground based, may become an important part of drone delivery, air taxi services and other aspects of the ever-expanding AAM ecosystem.”
Bell utilized radar systems to monitor the complex airspace within the AllianceTexas mobility innovation zone (MIZ) and track manned and unmanned aircraft systems. The MIZ provides one of the most unique environments in the nation for partner organizations to test, scale, and commercialize emerging technologies in air and surface mobility. Hillwood also provided multiple sites for radar setup, and testing was conducted at the AllianceTexas Flight Test Center located approximately four miles north of Fort Worth Alliance Airport.
“We are honored to partner with Bell to launch the testing initiatives as they work with NASA to lay the foundation for the future of budding air technologies,” said Christopher Ash, senior vice president of aviation business development for Hillwood. “The data they receive from these efforts will enable the industry to advance the commercialization of this technology across multiple platforms.”
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