It is the stuff of long-standing science fiction, but a prototype flying car has successfully made a test flight.
On 25 August, Japanese firm Sky Drive Inc held a public demonstration of the SD-03 at the Toyota Test Field. The single-seat vehicle drove around (and above the field) for four minutes. It was operated by a pilot, and monitored remotely by a technical team.
In a media release, the company described it as follows: ‘The aircraft has been designed to be the world’s smallest electric Vertical Take-Off and Landing (eVTOL) model as a new means of transportation for the near future. It measures a compact two meters high by four meters wide and four meters long and requires only as much space on the ground as two parked cars. The powertrain consists of electric motors that drive rotors deployed in four locations, with each location housing two rotors that individually rotate in opposite directions, each driven by its own motor. The use of eight motors is a means of ensuring safety in emergency situations during flight and as such aims to address compliance standards and allay potential regulatory concerns.’
Sky Drive CEO, Tomohiro Fukuzawa, said that the company was ‘extremely excited’ to have achieved this milestone after having founded the company in 2018. It aimed to ‘take our social experiment to the next level in 2023’ – by which time it hopes to have the vehicles ready for a commercial launch.
Image by benchtalks from Pixabay