On a single-pilot flight, one medical emergency in the left seat can leave everyone else aboard in an aircraft none of them can fly. Garmin’s answer, unveiled in 2019, is Autoland: press a button and the avionics handle everything from choosing a runway to shutting down the engine. Epic Aircraft’s contribution is more buttons.

On Wednesday, 30 September 2026, Bend, Oregon-based Epic announced that the FAA has certified Garmin Autoland on the E1000 AX, its six-seat, all-composite single-engine turboprop. Epic says the AX is the only high-performance single-engine aircraft with multiple Autoland buttons throughout the cabin, within reach of passengers. The system can also engage by itself if it determines that the pilot is incapacitated.

Existing owners are covered. The AX was delivered with provisions for Autoland, and an Epic spokesperson told AvBrief that the E1000 AX Autoland approval applies to aircraft already delivered, serial numbers K086 to K130, with retrofit kits shipping later in October. Two new AXs were delivered with the system installed the week before the announcement, according to the same report.

Where to put the button

Every Autoland aircraft needs an activation control, and every manufacturer has had to decide where it goes. Piper’s M600 uses a guarded switch on the instrument panel, the Cirrus Vision Jet a red button recessed into the overhead, the Daher TBM 940 an orange one on top of the panel, and the King Air 350 a button at the back of the centre pedestal.

Epic’s April 2025 launch release named two cases a button cannot cover: passengers unsure where it is, and flights with no passengers. For those, Autoland can wake itself up. In 2019 AOPA described how Garmin’s avionics spot a silent pilot: if nobody touches the panel or controls for a set time, the screens ask “Are you alert?” No response, and the system assumes the pilot is incapacitated.

There is a sales logic too. At the AX’s launch, Epic CEO Doug King told AOPA that “it’s normally the nonflying partner in the family that wants the Autoland.” Epic’s extra buttons speak directly to that buyer.

What happens after someone presses it

First, Autoland picks a destination, and not simply the nearest airport. Epic says it weighs distance, runway length, fuel range, terrain and weather; Garmin adds runway surface and obstacles. Garmin has said the runway also needs a GPS approach with lateral and vertical guidance, a key difference from airliner autoland, which is built around the radio beams of an instrument landing system.

Then it flies there, with Garmin Autothrottle managing power and a standard holding pattern if it needs more time to descend or slow down. And it talks. As AOPA described it in 2019, the system broadcasts its situation and destination on the tuned frequency and on 121.5 MHz every 30 seconds, listening first so it does not transmit over other calls, and sets the transponder to 7700.

The cabin gets its own briefing. The displays switch to a plain-language map showing the destination, the time and distance to go and the fuel remaining, while a voice explains what is happening. Passengers can also talk to air traffic control by following on-screen instructions.

Finally, Autoland lowers the gear and flaps, lands, brakes along the centreline to a full stop and shuts down the engine so the occupants can get out. AOPA reported in 2019 that it then announces on the local frequency that the airport is closed by a disabled aircraft, and plays a video showing passengers how to open the door. A pilot can cancel it with the autopilot disconnect, Garmin says.

Garmin’s official walk-through of an Autoland activation, from the button press and airport search to configuring the aircraft, touching down and rolling to a full stop.

The first real emergency was not what it seemed

Autoland’s first real-world emergency came on 20 December 2025. King Air 200 N479BR was climbing through 23,000 feet out of Aspen, Colorado, when it suffered a rapid, uncommanded loss of pressurisation. Garmin’s emergency systems engaged automatically, and Autoland landed the twin turboprop at Rocky Mountain Metropolitan Airport near Denver, its radio calls announcing a pilot incapacitation.

According to the operator, Buffalo River Aviation, neither pilot was incapacitated. Both put on oxygen masks and deliberately let the system finish the job, an exercise in “conservative judgment,” and the automated broadcasts caused the early reports of incapacitation. Nobody was hurt, no passengers were aboard, and the aircraft returned to service the next day.

From the M600 to the E1000 AX

That came more than five years after the first approval, on the Piper M600/SLS in May 2020. Daher’s TBM 940 followed that July as HomeSafe, and in August the Cirrus Vision Jet became the first jet with it, as Safe Return. Garmin announced Autoland as a retrofit for G1000 NXi-equipped King Air 200s in 2023 and called the King Air 350, approved in August 2025, the 11th certified model. Pilatus announced PC-12 PRO approval on 24 September 2026, six days before Epic.

The AX is Epic’s third certified model, after the E1000 in 2019 and the E1000 GX in 2021. Unveiled at Sun ’n Fun in April 2025 with more than 25 new features, it gained FAA type certification that July and EASA approval in July 2026. Its 1,200-shp Pratt & Whitney Canada PT6A-67A gives a 333-knot maximum cruise speed, a 34,000-foot maximum operating altitude and 1,560 nautical miles of range.

Autoland works through the AX’s Garmin G1000 NXi flight deck alongside Garmin Autothrottle, which manages engine power and guards against overspeed and underspeed. King called the approval “the result of years of dedicated engineering and testing.” The King Air episode showed the other half of the design: the buttons are for passengers, but the system does not need to be asked.

Sources: Epic Aircraft press release, 30 September 2026; AVweb, 1 October 2026; FLYING, 30 September 2026; General Aviation News, 1 October 2026; AeroTime, 1 October 2026; AvBrief, 1 October 2026; Aviation Consumer, 30 September 2026; GlobalAir, 1 October 2026; Epic Aircraft press releases, 1 April 2025, 21 July 2025 and 20 July 2026; Epic Aircraft E1000 AX product and specification pages; AOPA, 30 October 2019, 18 May 2020, 28 July 2020 and 2 April 2025; Business Jet Traveler, 4 November 2019; Garmin, 18 May 2020, 30 August 2020, 19 July 2023 and 27 August 2025; AeroTime, 22 December 2025 and 24 September 2026; CBS Colorado, 22 December 2025; AVweb, 23 December 2025; FLYING, 26 December 2025; Wikipedia, Autoland and Epic E1000