zzdcar
Home
/
Reviews
/
Tech
/
Airbus Plans To Test Its 'Flying Car' By The End Of 2017
Airbus Plans To Test Its 'Flying Car' By The End Of 2017-May 2024
2024-02-19 EST 22:10:38

Among the myriad hurdles that need to be cleared for so-called flying cars to start ferrying passengers through the sky, some tests actually need to be conducted. Airbus, one of several companies trying to launch vertical take-off and landing aircrafts, says it’ll be able to do that by the end of the year.

On Monday, the aerospace company published a number of photos of the Vahana plane, a single-seat vehicle that, Airbus says, is now being prepped for flight testing by the end of 2017. Yes, it looks more like a small helicopter, but companies involved in the development of VTOLs envision these aircraft to function more as a short-trip taxi service.

Airbus has a particularly ambitious timeline of putting electric autonomous craft in the sky by 2020, aiming to send them between rooftops of downtown urban cores.

In a blog post published Monday, the company outlined the process of transporting the craft to a new testing site in Oregon.

Once the caravan arrived in Oregon, the aircraft fuselage was unloaded from the truck at The Pendleton Unmanned Aerial Systems Range Mission Control and Innovation Center. The time had come for the first real-world test of Vahana’s landing gear handling and towing provisions. The aircraft was carefully towed along the quarter mile journey from the range’s main loading dock to its new home. In the photo above you can see Vahana engineers following along to make sure the fuselage made the last leg of the journey unscathed!

Airbus is and more in the interesting-but-still-very-very-unlikely effort of producing a commercially available VTOL by 2020. But, at the very least, we’ll hopefully soon be able to see how these things look in the sky, even if it is only for testing purposes.

Comments
Welcome to zzdcar comments! Please keep conversations courteous and on-topic. To fosterproductive and respectful conversations, you may see comments from our Community Managers.
Sign up to post
Sort by
Show More Comments
Tech
GM Says It's Dropping Apple CarPlay And Android Auto Because They're Unsafe (Update)
GM Says It's Dropping Apple CarPlay And Android Auto Because They're Unsafe (Update)
GM is still dealing with the fallout of its decision to drop Apple CarPlay and Android Auto in favor of developing its own in-house system. In the last eight months, the company has had to deal with while still maintaining its in-house system will be “.” Since neither of...
May 6, 2025
Volkswagen EVs Can Now Power Your House For Two Days (Update)
Volkswagen EVs Can Now Power Your House For Two Days (Update)
Experts have said that one of the ways to speed up EV adoption is for them to support . The ability for owners to power their house off their car or from the grid is vital. Just nine EVs on the market currently support bidirectional charging, but now VW...
May 6, 2025
Danish Investors Dump Tesla Shares After Elon Musk Calls Strikes In Sweden 'Insane'
Danish Investors Dump Tesla Shares After Elon Musk Calls Strikes In Sweden 'Insane'
Danish pension fund PensionDanmark is dumping all of its stock and putting the U.S. EV maker on its exclusion list of the companies it chooses to invest in – or not. The fund is selling all of its shares due to Elon Musk’s refusal to enter into labor agreements...
May 6, 2025
Biden’s First EV Charging Station Goes Online After $7.5 Billion In American EV Investments
Biden’s First EV Charging Station Goes Online After $7.5 Billion In American EV Investments
Despite in investments for the development of in the , not a single charging station had gone live thanks to — until now. The first EV charger paid for by Biden’s Bipartisan deal has come online in Ohio, according to , which marks the operational start of what the...
May 6, 2025
Truck Fans Would Rather Wait For A Toyota Tacoma EV Than Buy A F-150 Lightning Or Cybertruck
Truck Fans Would Rather Wait For A Toyota Tacoma EV Than Buy A F-150 Lightning Or Cybertruck
fans are already cooling on despite more options on the market and news of upcoming models from the likes of Chevy and Ram. The and have yet to be released, while the has recently joined the and for sale in the U.S. And, yet, all of these current and...
May 6, 2025
Costco Will Sell The Chevy Blazer EV At A Discount To Go With Your Rotisserie Chicken
Costco Will Sell The Chevy Blazer EV At A Discount To Go With Your Rotisserie Chicken
knows that you keep coming back for the and Kirkland brand, but you can now also buy a cheaper at your local warehouse. Chevy notified its dealers that members are eligible for a $1,000 rebate on the through January 2, according to . The discount is part of ,...
May 6, 2025
Copyright 2023-2025 - www.zzdcar.com All Rights Reserved