Electric Aircraft
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After making its first manned eVTOL flight last June, Florida's Doroni Aerospace has announced its next model. The H1X rocks coaxial ducted fans and pusher props, and targets 120 mph (200 km/h) cruise speeds for up to 40 minutes.
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Sikorsky is developing a hybrid-electric vertical takeoff and landing (HEX/VTOL) tilt-wing demonstrator. It's part of a new family of aircraft that'll run the company's new MATRIX autonomy suite, so it'll fly with or without a pilot.
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Three months after its first takeoff, the production-spec Midnight air taxi has finished the first phase of flight testing. With the release of a new video, Archer says it expects to fly this next-gen machine with human pilots on board this year.
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Things can get ugly and inefficient when a ground effect vehicle accidentally skims the water, adding significant drag that can drastically slow it down, wrench it sideways or just cost energy. One inventor is solving this problem with paddle wheels.
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In all the buzz around eVTOLs, there's still plenty of appetite for more conventional electric planes – especially, it seems, if they make ludicrous amounts of lift, and can take off and land at incredibly slow speeds, using absolutely tiny runways.
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The remarkable Seaglider promises a clean revolution in coastal transport; the convenience of an electric boat meets the speed and comfort of an aircraft, at unparalleled efficiency and range thanks to hydrofoils and the wing-in-ground effect.
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ZeroAvia is working with San Francisco startup Verne to bring an even more energy-dense form of hydrogen to the clean aviation space. Cryo-compressed H2 could reduce costs, speed up fueling, and unlock 40% more flight range than cryogenic liquid H2.
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A Dutch startup says everyone's hugely underestimating the potential of battery-electric aircraft – that it's possible to build large battery-electric airliners covering distances most assume we'll need hydrogen for. Elysian plans to prove it.
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The Sirius Jet will fly up to 1,150 miles (1,851 km) at speeds up to 323 mph (520 km/h) on a clean liquid-hydrogen powertrain. It'll rise vertically off a pad thanks to a deflected vectored thrust system using 20 smallish electric ducted fans.
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Hyundai's electric aircraft spinout has presented the eVTOL air taxi design it believes will "set the gold standard for Advanced Air Mobility." Supernal pulled the covers off its handsome S-A2 prototype at CES, built on a new airframe architecture.
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Hybrids could have almost as much potential in the air as they do on the ground. Ampaire says the clever first-gen hybrid powertrain in its Electric Eel demonstrator cuts fuel consumption by 50-70%, and it's just logged a world record for endurance.
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Two years ago, American air mobility company Electra announced that it was partnering with the US Air Force on the development of an ultra-short takeoff and landing (ultra-STOL) aircraft. Earlier this month, a demonstrator version of that plane made its first two flights.
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