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Uncrewed Aircraft Systems Traffic Management Beyond Visual Line of Sight (UTM BVLOS)
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By NASA
Credit: NASA NASA has awarded ASCEND Aerospace & Technology of Cape Canaveral, Florida, the Contract for Organizing Spaceflight Mission Operations and Systems (COSMOS), to provide services at the agency’s Johnson Space Center in Houston.
The COSMOS is a single award, indefinite-delivery/indefinite-quantity contract valued at $1.8 billion that begins its five-year base period no earlier than Dec. 1, with two option periods that could extend until 2034. The Aerodyne Company of Cape Canaveral, Florida, and Jacobs Technology Company of Tullahoma, Tennessee, are joint venture partners.
Work performed under the contract will support NASA’s Flight Operation Directorate including the Orion and Space Launch System Programs, the International Space Station, Commercial Crew Program, and the Artemis campaign. Services include Mission Control Center systems, training systems, mockup environments, and training for astronauts, instructors, and flight controllers.
For more information about NASA and agency programs, visit:
https://www.nasa.gov
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Tiernan Doyle
Headquarters, Washington
202-358-1600
tiernan.doyle@nasa.gov
Chelsey Ballarte
Johnson Space Center, Houston
281-483-5111
chelsey.n.ballarte@nasa.gov
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Last Updated Aug 28, 2025 LocationNASA Headquarters Related Terms
Johnson Space Center Artemis Commercial Crew International Space Station (ISS) ISS Research Johnson Flight Operations Space Launch System (SLS) View the full article
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By NASA
If you asked someone what they expected to see during a visit to NASA’s Johnson Space Center, they would probably list things like astronauts, engineers, and maybe a spacecraft or two. It might be a surprise to learn you can also spy hundreds of species of animals – from geckos and snakes to white-tailed deer and red-tailed hawks.
Ensuring those species and Johnson’s workforce can safely coexist is the main job of Matt Strausser, Johnson’s senior biologist for wildlife management. Strausser works to reduce the negative impacts animals can have on Johnson’s operations as well as the negative impact humans might have on native wildlife and their habitats.
NASA’s Johnson Space Center Senior Biologist Matt Strausser leads a nature hike to Johnson staff that detailed the native plant species and wildlife onsite, invasive species, and mitigation efforts.NASA/Lauren Harnett Strausser joined NASA in 2012, fresh out of graduate school, when he was hired on a six-month contract to write Johnson’s first Wildlife Management Plan. “My contract was extended a couple of times until I became a regular part of the facilities service contract, which is where I still am today,” he said.
Strausser remembers being interested in natural resources from a young age. “I spent a lot of my childhood poring through copies of National Geographic, hiking, and camping,” he said. When it was time for college, Strausser decided to study biology and natural resource management. He spent his summers in jobs or internships that mostly involved endangered wildlife species, including Attwater’s prairie chickens, which are bred at Johnson through a partnership with the Houston Zoo. Strausser noted that he conducted research across the country while he was a student, and even studied fish for a short time in the South Pacific.
“After all of those adventures in faraway places, I find it ironic that I ended up about 20 miles from where I grew up,” he said. “Once I got onsite, it did not take me long to find that this property has great remnant native plant communities, a fascinating land use history, and some unique natural resource challenges that come from the work done here. Those factors really drew me in and helped motivate me to build a career at Johnson.”
Matthew Strausser received a Silver Snoopy Award through NASA’s Space Flight Awareness Program in 2018, in recognition of his efforts to prevent and mitigate ant-inflicted damage to critical infrastructure electrical systems. From left: NASA astronaut Reid Weissman, Strausser, Strausser’s wife Kayla, NASA Acting Associate Administrator Vanessa Wyche. NASA Strausser’s work involves a variety of activities. First, he gathers data about Johnson’s wildlife populations and their habitats. “I use population counts, conflict records, satellite and aerial imagery, nest surveys, outside reports, and even historical data to get an understanding of what’s on the landscape and what problems we have to tackle,” he said.
With that information, Strausser works to engage project and facility managers and provide recommendations on how to prevent or reduce the impact of wildlife problems onsite. Strausser works with Johnson’s facilities maintenance group to modify buildings to keep animals on the outside, and he gets support from the Johnson veterinarian on animal health issues. He also works closely with Johnson’s pest control and groundskeeping contracts, as their work is often adjacent to wildlife management.
He supports the safety team, as well. “Our security contractors are a great resource for reporting wildlife issues as well as helping address them,” Strausser said, adding that some of Johnson’s safety groups “have been really helpful at getting the word out about how to stay safe around our wildlife” in coordination with the center’s internal communications team. His team also responds to wildlife conflict calls, which often involve capturing and relocating animals that have wandered into areas where they pose a risk to people or operations.
Additionally, Strausser runs the facilities contract’s small unmanned aircraft system, which uses drones to conduct facility inspections, support hurricane response, and survey on-site wildlife.
An on-site wildlife snapshot captured by the Johnson Space Center facilities contract’s small unmanned aircraft system. NASA The nature of his work has instilled in Strausser an appreciation for teamwork and collaboration among colleagues with distinct experiences. Each of the projects he works on involves team members from different organizations and contracts, and most of them do not have a background in biology. “Building a wildlife and natural resource program from the ground up and bringing all of these once-disconnected and diverse professionals together to effectively address problems – that is the achievement I take the most pride in,” he said.
Strausser observed that accomplishing the goals of the agency’s Artemis campaign will require a tremendous amount of specialized support infrastructure, and that developing and running that infrastructure will require a wide variety of professionals. “It is going to require students and specialists with all different types of backgrounds, passions, and talents.”
Overall, Strausser said he has a very dynamic job. “Wildlife issues tend to be very seasonal, so throughout the year, the types of issues I am addressing change,” he said. “On top of that, there are always new projects, problems, and questions out there that keep the work fresh and challenging.” He has learned the value of being open to new challenges and learning new skills. “Being adaptable can be just as important as mastery in a specific field,” he said.
An on-site wildlife snapshot captured by the Johnson Space Center facilities contract’s small unmanned aircraft system. NASA A Texas Longhorn relaxes onsite at Johnson Space Center, with Space Center Houston in the background.NASA Deer are plentiful on the Johnson Space Center campus.NASA A hawk perches in a tree at Johnson Space Center.NASA Attwater’s prairie chickens are bred at Johnson Space Center through a partnership with the Houston Zoo.NASA Explore More
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The Research Aircraft for electric Vertical takeoff and landing Enabling techNologies Subscale Wind Tunnel and Flight Test undergoes a free flight test on the City Environment Range Testing for Autonomous Integrated Navigation range at NASA’s Langley Research Center in Hampton, Virginia on April 22, 2025.NASA/Rob Lorkiewicz Flying the friendly skies may one day include time-saving trips in air taxis to get from point A to point B – and NASA researchers are currently working to make that future a reality.
They are using wind tunnel and flight tests to gather data on an electric Vertical takeoff and landing (eVTOL) scaled-down small aircraft that resembles an air taxi that aircraft manufacturers can use for their own designs.
As air taxis take to the skies, engineers need real-world data on air taxi designs to better understand flight dynamics and design better flight control systems. These systems help stabilize and guide the motion of an aircraft while in flight, making sure it flies safely in various conditions.
Currently, most companies developing air taxis keep the information about how their aircraft behaves internal, so NASA is using this small aircraft to produce public, non-proprietary data available to all.
“NASA’s ability to perform high-risk flight research for increasingly automated and autonomous aircraft is really important,” said Siena Whiteside, who leads the Research Aircraft for eVTOL Enabling techNologies (RAVEN) project. “As we investigate these types of vehicles, we need to be able push the aircraft to its limits and understand what happens when an unforeseen event occurs…”
For example, Whiteside said, “…when a motor stops working. NASA is willing to take that risk and publish the data so that everyone can benefit from it.”
Researchers Jody Miller, left, and Brayden Chamberlain, right, stand by a crane that is used for tethered flight testing of the Research Aircraft for electric Vertical takeoff and landing Enabling techNologies Subscale Wind Tunnel and Flight Test at NASA’s Langley Research Center in Hampton, Virginia on Oct. 18, 2024.NASA/Ben Simmons Testing Air Taxi Tech
By using a smaller version of a full-sized aircraft called the RAVEN Subscale Wind Tunnel and Flight Test (RAVEN SWFT) vehicle, NASA is able to conduct its tests in a fast and cost-effective manner.
The small aircraft weighs 38 pounds with a wingspan of six feet and has 24 independently moving components.
Each component, called a “control effector,” can move during flight to change the aircraft’s motion – making it an ideal aircraft for advanced flight controls and autonomous flight research.
The testing is ongoing at NASA’s Langley Research Center in Hampton, Virginia.
Researchers first used the center’s 12-Foot Low-Speed Tunnel in 2024 and have since moved on to flight testing the small aircraft, piloting it remotely from the ground. During initial flight tests, the aircraft flew while tied to a tether. Now, the team performs free flights.
Lessons learned from the aircraft’s behavior in the wind tunnel helped to reduce risks during flight tests. In the wind tunnel, researchers performed tests that closely mirror the motion of real flight.
While the scale aircraft was in motion, researchers collected information about its flight characteristics, greatly accelerating the time from design to flight.
The team also could refine the aircraft’s computer control code in real time and upload software changes to it in under 5 minutes, saving them weeks and increasing the amount of data collected.
Researchers Ben Simmons, left, and Greg Howland, right, upload software changes in real time to the Research Aircraft for electric Vertical takeoff and landing Enabling techNologies Subscale Wind Tunnel and Flight Test at NASA’s Langley Research Center in Hampton, Virginia on Aug. 8, 2024, during testing in the 12-Foot Low-Speed Tunnel.NASA/David C. Bowman Partners in Research
NASA developed the custom flight controls software for RAVEN SWFT using tools from the company MathWorks.
NASA and MathWorks are partners under a Space Act Agreement to accelerate the design and testing of flight control approaches on RAVEN SWFT, which can apply to future novel aircraft.
The work has allowed NASA’s researchers to develop new methods to reduce the time for an aircraft to achieve its first flight and become a finished product.
RAVEN SWFT serves as a steppingstone to support the development of a potential larger, 1,000 pound-class RAVEN aircraft that will resemble an air taxi.
This larger RAVEN aircraft is being designed in collaboration with Georgia Institute of Technology and also would serve as an acoustical research tool, helping engineers understand the noise air taxi-like aircraft create.
The larger aircraft would allow NASA to continue to collect data and share it openly.
By performing flight research and making its data publicly available, NASA aims to advance U.S. leadership in technology development for safe, quiet, and affordable advanced air mobility operations.
Watch this Air Taxi Tests Video
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Last Updated Aug 13, 2025 EditorJim BankeContactDiana Fitzgeralddiana.r.fitzgerald@nasa.govLocationNASA Langley Research Center Related Terms
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