Roads are no longer needed!
Roads! Who needs roads! This is exactly what the protagonist of the once popular sci-fi time travel trilogy Back to the Future 2, Dr. Emmett Brown, responded to his friend Marty McFly when he pointed out to him that there was no way to overclock on their fantastic car brand DeLorean DMC-12 , after which Emmett lifted the car into the air and went on another journey through time.
And now, after more than thirty years, flying cars have become a fashionable trend that promises to bring a smile when looking at traffic jams. The other day, the American manufacturer Alef Aeronautics introduced the “Model A” – an electric car (with one person on board), which can not only drive on roads, but also fly, in VTOL format. Traffic jam? Dead end? With Model A, all this is in the past!
What does Alef Aeronautics promise?
This is an electric vehicle with a range of 320 km on the ground and 170 km in the air. The press release explains that: “The cockpit design provides a smooth and stable ride and flight. For safety, noise reduction and space saving purposes, there are no exposed propellers. Key safety components include, but are not limited to, distributed electric propulsion, triple or eightfold redundancy of all major components, real-time diagnostics with thousands of points, pre-launch diagnostics, obstacle detection and avoidance, glide path landing, and ballistic parachute.”
When and how much?
“Production and deliveries are expected to begin in the fourth quarter of 2025. The first Alef flying car became available for pre-order starting October 19, 2022 at a price of $300,000, with a $150 deposit to be placed on the Standard List or a $1,500 deposit to be placed on the Priority Waiting List, at website https://alef.aero”. And for those who can wait, Alef Aeronautics is preparing a four-seat Model Z flying car for 2035. It will provide 640 km of autonomy on the ground and 320 in the air. It will be much more affordable, at just $35,000…
Investors
For those who look at all the above statements with a grain of salt, Alef Aeronautics, founded in 2015, explains that full-scale testing of the Model A and Z projects began in 2019. Both models were unveiled at a press conference at Draper University, and finally on the list of investors are people like: Tim Draper, one of the first to believe in and invest in Tesla, DARPA graduate Anthony Tether , Luis Scola of the NBA and Bugatti and Jaguar designer Hirash Razaghi. We think this is more than enough to ease the degree of distrust and finally accept the fact that technologies of this kind have long gone out of science fiction and very soon it will be possible to not only touch them, but use them.
The future is closer than you think…
In conclusion, we offer a look at another XPeng X2 flying vehicle from a Chinese company. XPeng Motorswhich was announced two weeks ago in Dubai.
