Seattle Aerospace Short Course - Course Listings
KU Aerospace Short Courses in Seattle
Course Schedule and Registration
Learn the latest industry knowledge from expert instructors
Early registration deadline: February 26, 2027
Click on any course title below to see the course description, and click on the blue button at the bottom of the course description to get additional course details and to register for the course.
Courses
Instructor: Pierre Trudel
April 12-16, 2027
8 a.m. - 4 p.m. Monday-Thursday and 8 a.m. - 11:30 a.m. Friday
Advanced System Safety will elevate students' safety process acumen by diving deeper into the safety process and introducing a small cradle to grave project to provide practical experience in using the safety process to help design and develop the proper set of documentation for compliance to requirements. Advanced topics that will be addressed in this training will include:
Revisiting Functional Hazard Assessment addressing partial failure conditions, recursive introduction of functional monitors within the Functional Hazard Assessment, and severity substantiation strategies (test, analysis, etc.) along with Human Factors and Crew Contingency Aspects of mitigations.
Understanding undetectable failures in a design and how to address them in analysis. We will also discuss prevention strategies and common errors that could increase the potential for latency failures to be introduced in a design.
Advanced fault tree modeling techniques and the ability to practice on an industry grade fault tree software.
Earn 31.5 classroom hours and 3.15 CEUs.
Who should attend?
This training primarily targets aerospace companies developing aircraft and aeronautical technologies under the oversight of regulators. The training will benefit engineering teams associated with the design and the showing of compliance for a given design (aircraft, systems, or parts). Other segments of industry (such as space and autonomous vehicles) that do not have a strongly defined regulatory enforcement can also benefit from this training. It is recommended that you have taken the following course prior to taking this course:System Safety Assessment for Commercial Aircraft Certification.
$2,595 (early registration)
$2,795 (regular registration)
Register for Advanced Topics in System Safety for Commercial Certification
Instructor: Roelof Vos
April 12-16, 2027
8 a.m. - 4 p.m. Monday-Friday
In this course participants learn how aerodynamics drive the detailed exterior design of transport aircraft. What aerodynamic phenomena play a role in the exterior design of a wing, a cockpit or an engine intake? What is the effect of aerodynamic add-ons such as vortex generators, fairings or winglets? What are the advantages and penalties of wing sweep, and how can the penalties be mitigated by the aerodynamic design of the wing? These are some of the questions this course addresses. Participants learn how the various aircraft components should be shaped in order to fulfill aerodynamic requirements in all corners of the flight envelope. The strong ties between aircraft performance, aircraft aerodynamics, and aircraft exterior design are also demonstrated through numerous historical and contemporary examples. Although the main focus is on jet aircraft, the course also covers the effects of propeller installation on the aerodynamic design of the empennage.
Earn 35 classroom hours and 3.5 CEUs.
Who should attend?
Designed for aeronautical engineers, pilots with some engineering background, government research laboratory personnel, engineering managers and educators.
$2,595 (early registration)
$2,795 (regular registration)
Instructor: Josh Sementi
April 12-16, 2027
8 a.m. - 4 p.m. Monday - Friday
This course provides an overview of aircraft structural external loads analysis including: criteria, design, analysis, fatigue, certification, validation, and testing. It covers CFR Part 25 airplane load requirements and the historical CFR Part 23 requirements which are the basis of the current ASTM standards. These concepts are applicable to many military structural requirements, UAV's, and other experimental or novel configuration aircraft.
Earn 35 classroom hours and 3.5 CEUs.
Who should attend?
This course is designed for practicing engineers and engineering managers whose responsibilities include aircraft Structures and Loads, either developing Loads, as a recipient of Loads data, or providing input data for Loads analysis.
$2,595 (early registration)
$2,795 (regular registration)
Register for Aircraft Structural Loads: Criteria, Analysis, and Validation
Instructor: C. Bruce Stephens
April 12-16, 2027
8 a.m. - 4 p.m. Monday - Thursday, 8 a.m. - 11:30 a.m. Friday
This course discusses the FAA Code of Federal Regulations (CFRs) and design concepts required to ensure all aspects of aircraft electrical wiring and installation are safe. It examines aircraft wiring as a system and reviews all Part 25 CFRs related to EWIS FAA certification. Student teams will review FAA Advisory Circulars and present practical applications of the information in a simulation of the EWIS certification process. EWIS requirements for aircraft maintenance and inspection will also be discussed.
Earn 31.5 classroom hours and 3.15 CEUs.
Who should attend?
The course is designed for all aircraft design areas including electrical, avionics, and HIRF/lightning engineers and aircraft technicians. Aircraft managers and project engineers working in electrical/avionics related areas should also attend.
$2,595 (early registration)
$2,795 (regular registration)
Register for Electrical Wiring Interconnection System (EWIS) and FAA Requirements
Instructor: Travis Dahna
April 12-16, 2027
8 a.m. - 4 p.m. Monday - Thursday, 8 a.m. - 11:30 a.m. Friday
This course will prepare you to develop a thorough FAA certification plan/project specific certification plan (CP/PSCP) that meets the requirements of Order 8110.4C associated with new type certification projects. Tools for developing a robust compliance checklist (CCL) and the use of appropriate means of compliance will be discussed in detail, including the necessary sections, required information and how to define the appropriate documentation supporting those means of compliance. You will utilize the outline and sample template of a certification plan, which can be crafted to meet your project's specific needs. You will also become familiar with the requirements and activities associated with an FAA conformity plan.
This course requires background knowledge of the FAA organizational structure and is the third course in the following three-part FAA course series:
1. Introduction to FAA Airworthiness Approval Requirements
2. FAA Type Certification Process
3. FAA Type Certification Plan Development
Prerequisite: Before registering for this course, it is required you have completed Introduction to FAA Airworthiness Approval Requirements and FAA Type Certification Process or have significant experience working in the FAA.
Earn 31.5 classroom hours and 3.15 CEUs.
Who should attend?
Those actively involved in product or article certification (aircraft/equipment OEM, aircraft modifiers, suppliers and ODA personnel) including airworthiness engineers, consultants, certification specialists, FAA designers (engineering/manufacturing), and FAA Organization Designation Authorization (ODA) unit and support personnel.
$2,595 (early registration)
$2,795 (regular registration)
Instructor: Gernot Konrad
April 12-16, 2027
8 a.m. - 4 p.m. Monday - Friday
The goal of human factors engineering in civil flight deck design is to ensure that the pilot compartment and its installed systems and equipment support safe aircraft operation and comply with applicable certification regulations, are easy to use, maximize human-machine performance, and provide a superior pilot experience. Flight deck human factors engineers work to support a pilot-centered flight deck development process. They generate requirements by applying data-driven knowledge about the pilot's capabilities and limitations and validate them through analysis and structured evaluations/tests. This course is intended to give engineers, pilots, and managers involved in the design and certification of civil flight decks an introduction to the required human factors engineering activities. The course reviews the physical, physiological, psychological, and cognitive performance capabilities of flight crews. It explores the limitations of pilots' performance and how they are impacted by systemic variables in the flight deck environment. It then examines how pilots' capabilities and limitations impact crew workload and human error. The course builds a theoretical human factors engineering foundation for designing and assessing civil flight decks and their installed systems and equipment. The course provides flight deck design examples and accident analysis from a human factors point of view. Key topics include applicable certification regulations, design guidelines, industry standards, and means of compliance.
Earn 35 classroom hours and 3.5 CEUs.
Who should attend?
This course is intended for engineers/scientists, pilots, and managers at aircraft manufacturers, system/equipment suppliers, regulators, accident investigation bodies, and research/teaching facilities involved in the design, evaluation/test, and/or certification of flight decks for civil aircraft.
$2,595 (early registration)
$2,795 (regular registration)
Register for Human Factors Engineering for Civil Flight Deck Design and Certification
Instructor: John Norton
April 12-16, 2027
8 a.m. - 4 p.m. Monday - Friday
The end user will inherit a system that is safe, but has latent deficiencies, has been mostly tested against system specifications and has undergone limited "real world" integrated systems testing. Total system performance is of primary importance to the end user, and this is the primary responsibility of Operational Test and Evaluation (OT&E) - to test an operationally representative system, in an operationally representative environment, using typical operators and maintainers against user requirements. This OT&E course is designed to introduce students to the language, processes and assorted tools to estimate, plan, accomplish risk assessment, provision, conduct, analyze and report on operational tests. It focuses on the challenges of safe and effective OT&E of ground support elements, aerospace vehicles, on-board systems, human-system interaction issues and logistics suitability.
Earn 35 classroom hours and 3.5 CEUs.
Who should attend?
This class is designed specifically for operators, maintainers, engineers and other support personnel. It is also appropriate for those personnel involved in planning, provisioning, conducting, reporting and supporting operational test activities. The course is applicable for military and civilian students as well as academic researchers. It may also be beneficial to those involved in writing user requirements or those involved with defining new system concepts based on market analysis.
$2,595 (early registration)
$2,795 (regular registration)
Register for Operational Test and Evaluation: Customer-Focused Testing
Instructor: Dennis C. Philpot
April 12-16, 2027
8 a.m. - 4 p.m. Monday - Thursday, and 8 a.m. - 11:30 a.m. on Friday
This course is designed for the practicing engineer who has an interest in the various aspects of stress analysis in aerospace structural-mechanical design and would like to enhance his or her expertise in this important field. The approach taken in this course is to start with a strong theoretical foundation and then build upon that foundation with practical applications that can be immediately put into practice in the workplace. In this manner, both the theory and practice of classical "hand" analysis techniques are presented as well as the more modern (numerical/computational) methods used in the industry. The subject-matter difficulty level is intermediate.
Earn 31.5 classroom hours and 3.15 CEUs.
Who should attend?
$2,595 (early registration)
$2,795 (regular registration)
Instructor: Max Kismarton
April 12-16, 2027
8 a.m. - 4 p.m. Monday - Friday
This course provides an introduction to high-performance composite materials, covering both engineering and manufacturing of composite parts and assemblies, basic material properties of the constituents (fiber and matrix), how they combine to form plies, or lamina, how to obtain lamina properties, how laminae are combined to form laminates and how to obtain the laminate properties. Other engineering topics include stress analysis, failure criteria and testing methods. Case studies and lessons-learned will be discussed. Design using composites will include material selection, lamination rules of thumb, weight analysis, fabrication process description, tool design, and preliminary cost and production rate analysis.
Earn 35 classroom hours and 3.5 CEUs.
Who should attend?
The course has proven very helpful to those wanting a broad overview and/or a crash course in composites, experienced engineers looking for a refresher course, stress engineers wanting to understand how composites really work or fail and what to look out for when analyzing parts, data and margins, practicing engineers and managers with metal experience wishing to expand their skill set, anyone wanting to jump into the field but does not know how to go about it, and engineering teams embarking on new projects involving composites.
$2,595 (early registration)
$2,795 (regular registration)