UK Vertical Lift Network

Congratulations to Dr Richard Brown FRAeS and Dr Michael Pryce
Recognised for Outstanding Contributions to Aerospace Art, Science and Engineering

The UK Vertical Lift Network is pleased to congratulate Dr Richard Brown FRAeS and Dr Michael Pryce on this well-deserved honour. Both have played a pivotal role in advancing safety for helicopter and eVTOL operations.

Their work has fundamentally changed how the industry understands rotor outwash—how it forms, how it evolves close to the ground, and how people actually respond when exposed to it. This research has brought long-needed clarity to a safety issue that affects operations at hospitals, heliports, and future vertiports.

Importantly, their findings have raised awareness among clinicians, operators and the public, and have encouraged regulators and designers worldwide to rethink how outwash is assessed and managed. This has already begun to influence the design and operation of next-generation vertical lift aircraft.

On behalf of the UK Vertical Lift Network, we offer our sincere congratulations to Richard and Michael, and our thanks for their outstanding contribution to improving rotorcraft and eVTOL safety.

The Chairman’s Award of 51st European Rotorcraft Forum (ERF 2025), Venice, Italy, Sep. 9–12, 2025 for the best collaborative paper goes to Xun Huang, Linghai Lu, James Whidborne, and Marilena Pavel, for the work “A Bio-Inspired Hybrid Flapping Wing Rotor for High-Efficiency Micro Rotorcraft”. They will present their paper at the 2026 edition of the Asian/Australian Rotorcraft Forum in Japan.

Two key members of the Vertical Lift Network (VLN), Professor Mark White from the University of Liverpool and Dr. Linghai Lu from Cranfield University, have jointly contributed to a newly published open-access book titled Rotorcraft Certification by Simulation and Analysis.

Published by Springer Nature Switzerland, this book outlines the essential steps for applying rotorcraft flight modelling, simulation, and analysis in support of certification under EASA CS-27 and CS-29, SUBPART B—FLIGHT, as well as other flight-related regulations such as CS-27/29 Appendix B (Airworthiness Criteria for Helicopter Instrument Flight).

Padfield G.D., van ‘t Hoff S., Hofmeister P., Lu L., White M., et al. (2025). Rotorcraft Certification by Simulation and Analysis. Springer Nature Switzerland. Available at: https://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-3-031-86398-1

• We successfully hosted the RAeS Flight Simulation Group (FSG) meeting at Cranfield, marking a significant revival after a four-year hiatus due to COVID. This achievement wouldn't have been possible without the unwavering support and collaboration from my department and human factor colleagues. The meeting turned out to be both enjoyable and incredibly productive, setting a positive momentum for the future. We look forward to enhancing the FSG activities in the coming months (FSG meeting at Cranfield).

• John Perry was Former Chief Aerodynamicist at Westlands and leader of the aerodynamic development of the BERP blade and a chief aerodynamicist in the record-breaking Lynx helicopter programme (1986). The rotorcraft community has lost a giant of helicopter aerodynamics. More news to follow.

• A consoritum of six universities in the UKVLN is successful in being awarded a £3.5M EPSRC Standard Research grant. MENtOR is aiming to develop and validate methods and tools that can be used for the design and analysis of the next-generation rotorcraft. In addition to research tasks, the grant will be used to fund the ongoing dissemination activities of the UKVLN. See Recently Funded Research for more details.