Job titles of the future: Delivery drone air traffic controller

摘要: Culture

Job titles of the future: Delivery drone air traffic controller

Trevor Wischnewsky is making sure that the sky stays organized as we enter t

正文

Job titles of the future: Delivery drone air traffic controller

Trevor Wischnewsky is making sure that the sky stays organized as we enter the age of food delivery by drone.

Eamon Whalen

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October 9, 2026

NHUNG LÊ

The moment Trevor Wischnewsky heard that drones were delivering pizza and sushi around his Texas neighborhood, his mind was made up. “It was super fascinating,” he says. “I just immediately wanted to be a part of it.” Wischnewsky is now an RPIC, or “remote pilot in command,” at a company called FlyTrex. An RPIC is like an air traffic controller. But instead of airplanes, this new class of aviators tend to fleets of hexa­copter drones that ferry cargo to homes and businesses within a three-mile radius. Not only does he ensure the safe passage of FlyTrex’s parcels, but Wischnewsky coordinates traffic with a growing swarm of delivery drones dotting the skies over Dallas from competitors like Zipline, Amazon, and Alphabet’s Wing. Here’s what it takes to land the gig.

Aviation experience

When he applied to FlyTrex, Wischnewsky was in training to become a commercial pilot and flight instructor, and he was already certified by the Federal Aviation Administration as a drone pilot. The company requires this credential, along with a weeks-long FAA-approved training course, to ensure that a pilot is prepared to take over a drone if need be. Though he doesn’t pilot the craft, Wischnewsky monitors the delivery process from FlyTrex’s operations center with the help of inputs from GPS, lasers, and a range of sensors.

A collaborative mindset

At first, the biggest challenge was trusting the technology. “On the manned-­aircraft side, they tell you ‘Don’t trust the automation,’” Wischnewsky says. The Dallas–Fort Worth area, though, is a

testing ground

for unmanned aircraft systems traffic management (UTM), a network that allows autonomous drones from FlyTrex and its competitors to share their coordinates in real time to help avoid collisio

来源: MIT Technology Review