Defensive Drone Pilot & Systems Engineer

Sentradel; Minden (NV); On-site; USD 70,000 - 110,000; Full time

Job summary

Sentradel in Minden, Nevada is hiring a Drone Operator for full-time, in-person work at our US testing ranges. You will build, program, and fly the drones used by our turret to defeat small drone threats, and run the flight side of live customer demos.

You own the fleet end to end: airframes, firmware, flight profiles, and repairs between sorties. The role involves frequent travel for range tests and customer demonstrations across the United States.

Qualifications

• Extensive ArduPilot experience: Mission Planner, parameter tuning, custom builds, and reading a log to explain why the aircraft did what it did.
• Able to read, modify, compile, and flash ArduPilot code.
• FAA Part 107 Remote Pilot Certificate.
• Drones built from bare frames: soldering, wiring, ESCs, motors, power, and RF.
• Expert level stick time, manual and autonomous.
• Fixed a broken aircraft in the field and flown it again the same day.

Responsibilities

• Build, wire, solder, and repair the target drone fleet
• Flash and configure flight controllers, tune aircraft for repeatable test profiles
• Modify ArduPilot source to get behavior stock firmware will not do, including speed caps, failsafes, and autonomous attack profiles
• Plan and fly autonomous missions that produce consistent, repeatable engagements for the turret
• Serve as pilot in command at range tests and customer demos across the US
• Own batteries, radios, ground stations, and spares so a test day never stops for a missing part
• Pull flight logs and turn them into usable test data for the engineering team

Skills

ArduPilot experience

Code reading & tweaking

FAA Part 107 Remote Pilot Certificate

Drones built from frames

Expert stick time (manual & autonomous

Field repair & on-site debugging

Tools

Mission Planner

Job description

Sentradel in Minden, Nevada is hiring a Drone Operator for full-time, in-person work at our US testing ranges. You will build, program, and fly the drones used by our turret to defeat small drone threats, and run the flight side of live customer demos.

You own the fleet end to end: airframes, firmware, flight profiles, and repairs between sorties. The role involves frequent travel for range tests and customer demonstrations across the United States.