PENDLETON — The Pendleton Unmanned Aerial Systems Range may have lost its two most prominent customers in recent months, but test range officials are still projecting clear skies ahead.

Steve Chrisman, airport manager and economic development director, told the Pendleton City Council at a Tuesday, June 9 workshop that staff was anticipating more than $700,000 in gross revenue by the end of the fiscal year on June 30.

That’s a far cry from 2016, when the range grossed only $3,575 and oversaw two drone operations, one of which Chrisman admitted was a “publicity stunt.”

“I didn’t mention it back then but I’m telling you now,” he said.

But according to Chrisman, the present-day test range is the real deal, largely thanks to the host of customers that now use it.

The UAS range may have lost defense contractor PAE last year, but Chrisman said its assets and rental space was quickly snapped up by American Aerospace Technologies. Range Manager Darryl Abling said the Pennsylvania company’s operations will eventually ramp up to include 60 employees based in Pendleton.

The range also lost Airbus around the same time, but Abling pointed to the several customers that were continuing to utilize space and equipment at the airport, including ArgenTech Solutions, a New Hampshire company with an office in Vancouver, Washington, Cubic of San Diego and Insitu, a subsidiary of Boeing. He also teased a customer who had signed a nondisclosure agreement with the city, but he hoped the company would go public with their project soon.

Business has picked up enough that Abling said the airport wants to hire a “range operations specialist,” a staff member dedicated to coordinating the test flight schedule.

But the test range’s big push is coming in the form of land expansion.

Using a combination of local, state and federal money, the city is in the process of building more hangars and moving forward with plans to create an industrial park on the north end of the airport.

Associate Engineer Wayne Green told the council that the city just received bids for the northern expansion and airport staff are starting discussions on building manufacturing facilities in the area. The city expects to complete the park in April 2021.

While most employees at the UAS range are transplants or transients, Steve Lawn, chief UAS engineer, said he’s working on ways to create more of a local pipeline.

Lawn said the range plans to hire five summer interns to work on various projects around the airport, adding that the program has had success in the past connecting interns with permanent jobs.