Airbus Flying Taxi

However, the Alpha One demonstrator is a big deviation from the Airbus range of products. With a fully electrical engine, it provides a big step forward for your battery-powered flying. Airbus' endeavours here are remarkable because, to put it in a nutshell, there are no electrically propelled planes or even gas-electric hybrids in service today.

To fly takes an unbelievable amount of fuel, and today's batteries simply don't provide the power-to-weight ratios needed to get you started. The Vahana is not only Airbus' game in electrical flying. Last year, the major player in the aviation and space industry in Europe heralded its cooperation with Rolls-Royce and Siemens on a hybrid electrical jet engine prototypes, the E-Fan Winter, which will demonstrate that the mix of traditional and electrical propulsion can work.

In 2015 Airbus flown a demonstration of the E-Fan across the English Channel, but the E-Fan later disappeared. So, when a listed firm like Airbus (market capitalisation 76 billion dollars) with all its shareholders and directors invests in a ridiculously ringing firm like "flying taxis", it can only have the feeling that we are on the verge of some big breaks.

Look at Ehang, the China droning firm that recently unveiled its own stand-alone electrical passenger-carrying quad copter. Volocopter, which is aiming to start an electrically flying taxi in Dubai soon. Zunum Aero, the electrical aircraft starter supported by Boeing and JetBlue. I' m kind of scared of flying.