Old Suttonian Tom Brunt (2016 F) was recently involved in the first ever landing of a fixed wing autonomous aircraft on to the deck of a British Aircraft Carrier, HMS Prince of Wales. The device is designed to land automatically but as this was the first ever attempt at doing this, it was landed manually by Tom himself, in front of the Captain of HMS Prince of Wales and other senior naval figures (Tom is pictured second from the left in the picture above). The landing went very well and there is a link to a short You Tube video of the landing, as well as a more detailed report of the project, at the end of this article.

Tom attended SVPS and then went on to study at SVS from 2009 until 2016. Upon leaving School, he completed an MEng in Aeronautical Engineering at Southampton University. He then went on to join the Southampton-based company who have produced the autonomous aircraft, W Autonomous Systems, as their test pilot and a development engineer. W Autonomous Systems is a leading-edge British firm which is developing long-range, heavy-lift autonomous drones for defence.

Congratulations to Tom for such a milestone in his career, which we are sure will go from strength-to-strength. 

Royal Naval News - https://www.royalnavy.mod.uk/news-and-latest-activity/news/2023/september/08/20230907-first-aircraft-drone-on-board-hms-prince-of-wales

YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_biLwba70TU