Over 17 hours, an artificial intelligence agent flew the Lockheed Martin VISTA X-62A training aircraft.
VISTA (Variable In-flight Simulation Test Aircraft) can simulate the performance characteristics of other aircraft using the software. Instead, it imitated a human pilot on this occasion.
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The flight took place in December during a testing period. According to Lockheed, this is the first time AI has been used in this manner on a tactical aircraft. The platform will be used to test aircraft designs that can fly autonomously.
“VISTA will allow us to parallelize the development and test of cutting-edge artificial intelligence techniques with new uncrewed vehicle designs,” US Air Force Test Pilot School (USAF TPS) director of research Dr. M. Christopher Cotting said in a statement.
“This approach, combined with focused testing on new vehicle systems as they are produced, will rapidly mature autonomy for uncrewed platforms and allow us to deliver tactically relevant capability to our warfighter.”
Lockheed’s skunkworks division collaborated with Calspan to develop VISTA for the USAF TPS at Edwards AFB in California.
The VISTA programme has been used to develop the virtual heads-up display and voice command input system for the F-35 Lightning II, among other things.
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The United States Air Force recently upgraded the VISTA X-62A with Lockheed’s Model Following Algorithm (MFA) and System for Autonomous Control of Simulation (SACS).
When these systems are combined, they enable VISTA to conduct advanced flight tests that leverage autonomy and AI.
