USAF's F-16 to fly pilotless for first time in 2025

The US Air Force (USAF) plans to conduct the first flight of a pilotless F-16 Fighting Falcon in 2025 as part of its effort to advance the use of autonomous capabilities in its aircraft fleet. The trials will be conducted under the Viper Experimentation and Next-gen Operations Model – Autonomy Flying Testbed programme (VENOM-AFT).

An official spokesperson for the service told Shephard that this effort is currently undergoing developmental and operational testing at the 96th Test Wing, in Eglin Air Force Base (Florida).

“The next step for the VENOM programme is to modify the F-16 aircraft into test platforms to rapidly evaluate autonomous capabilities”, the official said. “Those modifications are currently expected later this summer”.

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VENOM-AFT initiative is designed and funded to accelerate the testing of autonomy software on crewed and uncrewed aircraft as well as to complement the autonomy data and artificial intelligence (AI) experimentation at Eglin.

Its goal is to enable the air force to rapidly iterate and expand the body of knowledge for potential autonomy and payload solutions. In April, the service assigned the first three F-16 Fighting Falcons to take part in this programme.

“The F-16 was chosen as the VENOM platform due to its operational relevancy”, the USAF official claimed. “Aspects of the programme will leverage the F-16’s inherent capabilities to expand our understanding of autonomy’s role in future defence applications."

Shephard Defence Insight notes that the F-16 has been in service with the USAF since 1970s. The branch has operated several versions of the Falcon family.

The outcomes of the VENOM experimentation with F-16 will inform the Collaborative Combat Aircraft programme and other autonomy developers.

The USAF has been also advancing with the Variable In-flight Simulation Test Aircraft (VISTA) effort. In April, the Secretary of the Air Force Frank Kendall flew in the front seat of a X-62A VISTA aircraft at Edwards Air Force Base, in California.

During Kendall’s flight, the controls of the aircraft remained untouched and the platform conducted several tactical manoeuvres under the control of highly specialised software to test autonomous flying and other cutting-edge capabilities.

Variable in-flight Simulation Test Aircraft (VISTA) recently flew under the control of highly specialized software. (Photo: US Air Force)

This technology was tested through a collaboration between the USAF and the Defense Advanced Research Project Agency (DARPA) as part of DARPA’s Air Combat Evolution (ACE) programme.

DARPA also conducts the Aircrew Labor In-cockpit Automation System (ALIAS) project, which focuses on developing and flight demonstrating a flexible extensible automation architecture for existing manned aircraft that enables safe, reduced crew operations.

As part of the ALIAS initiative, in 2022, the agency demonstrated to the US Army how a UH-60 Black Hawk flying autonomously can perform logistic and rescue missions. The experiment was conducted in October under Project Convergence 2022 at the army’s Yuma Proving Ground (Arizona).

Without pilots on board, the autonomous Black Hawk performed long-endurance medical resupply while navigating between mountain ranges. It flew 134km loaded with 227kg of real and simulated blood.

On reaching 64km from its take-off point, the helicopter descended into a valley as low as 200ft above ground level at 100kt to perform terrain masking.