Jump Aero Welcomes New Adviser: Former NASA Autonomy Expert and Collier Trophy Winner, Mark A. Skoog

PETALUMA, Calif., Feb. 11, 2022 /PRNewswire/ -- Jump Aero Incorporated is pleased to announce the addition of autonomous aircraft systems expert, Mark A. Skoog, to the Jump Aero Advisory Board. Mr. Skoog was the Principle Investigator for Autonomy Research at NASA's Armstrong Flight Research Center prior to joining the Jump Aero board of advisers.  Mr. Skoog will provide strategic guidance regarding the development of autonomous systems on the Jump Aero eVTOL aircraft.   

Mr. Skoog has led a collaborative effort between NASA, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) and the Department of Defense (DoD) and industry to develop certification methods for autonomous vehicles. Most recently, he was the lead for the Resilient Autonomy project at NASA Armstrong where his team developed the Expandable Variable Autonomy Architecture (EVAA) system.

During his 40-year career, Mr. Skoog has supported numerous NASA and U.S. Air Force fighter aircraft and unmanned aircraft vehicle (UAV) research efforts, including the testing and evaluation of the F-16, B-2 and the Global Hawk. His work includes the integration of flight controls and avionics with high authority autopilots to automatically accomplish all phases of fighter combat missions. Most of his career has been in the development of full vehicle autonomy and automatic collision avoidance systems for both ground and air.

Mr. Skoog and his team won the 2020 United States Geospatial Intelligence Foundation's achievement award for his work on the terrain system development and evaluation for Auto GCAS. The Auto GCAS team also was awarded the 2018 Robert J. Collier Trophy by the National Aeronautic Association.

"Jump Aero's concept of operations and life-saving mission is an appealing early commercialization pathway for the autonomous flight technologies I have been developing for most of my career."
– Mr. Mark Skoog

"Mark will bring incredible depth in practical implementation of certifiable autonomous aircraft systems to Jump Aero's board of advisers.  His deep experience with Run Time Assurance architectures and his development of fielded automatic ground collision avoidance will help Jump Aero save lives with our high-performance eVTOL aircraft."
– Dr. Carl Dietrich, Founder & President of Jump Aero Incorporated

Jump Aero was founded in 2019 by experienced aviation entrepreneurs to help the every-day heroes of our society: First Responders. The company's mission is to enable first responders to fly to the scene of an emergency and begin life saving measures as fast as possible. Jump Aero expects to cut emergency response time in half – helping first responders save thousands of lives.

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SOURCE Jump Aero