Sabrina Saunders-Hodge serves as Senior Director of Crown’s Programs and Engineering practice. She oversees the practice’s technical engagements while directing the growth and diversification of a business portfolio that supplies software development and systems engineering services to enhance aviation safety and performance.
Saunders-Hodge brings 30-plus years of experience in leading FAA initiatives to adopt innovative communications, navigation, and surveillance (CNS) technologies and paving the way for integrating new entrants into the national airspace (NAS). Examples of her early career contributions include defining the future role of satellite communications in air traffic control and developing the International Civil Aviation Organization’s global plan for transitioning civil aviation to future CNS systems. She co-managed oversight of FAA/European cooperative R&D initiatives and helped to craft operational concepts for technology enhancements within the NAS. Saunders-Hodge also served as program manager in standing up and directing the FAA’s first Unmanned Aircraft Systems (UAS) Center of Excellence: ASSURE.
Saunders-Hodge’s FAA career culminated with a nine-year stint as Director of the Research, Engineering and Analysis Division of the Unmanned Aircraft Systems Integration Office. She served as the FAA’s focal point for UAS and advanced air mobility integration research, spearheading agency efforts to build a strategic planning framework to guide research to promote integration of emerging entrants into the NAS. She helped forge collaborative relationships with industry, U.S. federal, state, local, and tribal stakeholders, as well as international civil aviation authorities. She also managed the FAA’s UAS Test Site and UAS Broad Agency Announcement Programs.
Saunders-Hodge holds a bachelor’s and master’s degrees in computer science from the University of Maryland and Johns Hopkins University, respectively. She is a certified Project Management Professional and a graduate of the Federal Executive Institute. In 2023, she was one of 12 women from around the world inducted by the prestigious Women and Drones organization into the inaugural class of Women in Emerging Aviation Technologies Hall of Fame.
