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Salary: USD 210,000 - 338,000 / annual
CHAOS Industries is seeking a Principal Guidance, Navigation & Control (GNC) Systems Engineer to own the GNC architecture for the Massed Modular Aircraft (MMA) program. This is a hands-on technical leadership role focused on multi-aircraft interoperation—designing the behaviors, algorithms, and simulation environments that enable multiple MMA air vehicles to fly, coordinate, and interact safely and effectively in shared airspace.
Key Responsibilities:
You will own the complete GNC architecture for the MMA platform, including flight control laws, navigation/state estimation, and guidance/trajectory management. You'll design control laws and guidance algorithms suited to the platform's flight envelope, autonomy level, and mass-production constraints. You'll define sensor fusion and state estimation approaches (GPS/INS integration, relative navigation between aircraft) supporting both single-vehicle and multi-aircraft operations.
A critical focus is developing and maintaining 6DOF simulation environments capable of modeling multiple MMA aircraft operating simultaneously, including vehicle-to-vehicle interaction, relative positioning, formation behaviors, and collision avoidance. You'll use these simulations to design, test, and verify guidance and control behaviors under realistic mass-employment scenarios (simultaneous launches/recoveries, coordinated maneuvering, formation-keeping).
You'll define the simulation architecture (real-time vs. non-real-time, distributed/networked simulation) suited to verifying multi-vehicle GNC behavior at scale, and validate simulation fidelity against flight test data. You'll perform stability and performance analysis (linear and nonlinear) across the platform's flight envelope and configuration variants, and analyze multi-aircraft interaction effects relevant to safety of flight, including separation assurance and failure mode behavior in dense operations.
You'll support System Safety Analysis (SSA) and Failure Modes and Effects Analysis (FMEA) for GNC functions, define the GNC verification and validation approach spanning simulation, hardware-in-the-loop, ground test, and flight test, and define GNC-related flight test objectives and success criteria. You'll support flight test planning, execution, and post-test data analysis, correlating flight results back to simulation predictions.
You'll lead root-cause investigation of GNC-related anomalies, ensure GNC algorithms are compatible with a modular, mass-producible platform tolerant to manufacturing variation, and partner with Systems Engineering and Mission Systems to ensure GNC design supports distributed and coordinated operational employment concepts. You'll serve as the senior technical authority for GNC on the program, representing the discipline at PDR, CDR, and government technical interchange meetings, and identify and manage GNC-related technical risks.
Requirements:
- Bachelor's degree in Aerospace Engineering, Mechanical Engineering, Electrical Engineering, or related discipline; M.S./Ph.D. in a relevant GNC/controls discipline preferred.
- 15+ years of guidance, navigation, and control engineering experience for aircraft or unmanned aircraft systems.
- Demonstrated, hands-on experience developing and using 6 degree-of-freedom (6DOF) simulations involving multiple interacting aircraft (not limited to single-vehicle 6DOF simulation).
- Strong background in flight control law design, state estimation/navigation algorithms, and stability/performance analysis.
- Experience supporting flight test planning, execution, and data correlation back to simulation/analysis predictions.
- Preferred: Experience with modular, attritable, low-cost, or mass-producible aircraft programs; ability to obtain/maintain Secret/Top Secret/SCI clearance.
