A vehicle billed as a flying automobile has received certification from the US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) for testing. This vehicle is the first entirely electric vehicle (EV) to get official US permission to fly and drive on roads.
The Model A Vehicle/Aircraft
Alef Automotive, a startup based in California, claims that its Model A vehicle/aircraft is the first of its kind that can be driven legally on public roads and parked in standard car spaces. In addition, it can take off and land vertically.
It can supposedly transport one or two people and has a highway range of 200 miles and a flight range of 110 miles.
In a report by Peacefmonline, each car will cost $300,000 to purchase, and the first deliveries are scheduled for the end of 2025. More than 400 of the cars had refundable pre-orders, the business said.
As stated on the company's website, the flying car will be classified as a low-speed vehicle, meaning it would be limited to speeds of no more than 25 miles per hour when driven on a standard roadway.
"The assumption is that, if a driver needs a faster route, a driver will use Alef's flight capabilities," the business said on the website.
The FAA just approved a flying car for testing.
— Noor Chopra (@noorg420) July 4, 2023
Alef Automotive said that its vehicle/aircraft is the first flying vehicle that's drivable on public roads and parkable like a normal car.
The vehicle is set to sell for $300,000 each with the first delivery by the end of 2025. pic.twitter.com/riXt2xnyRp
A Special Airworthiness Certificate
The FAA stated that it had awarded the corporation a special airworthiness certificate for use in certain situations, such as display and research and development, as reported by CNN.
Several manufacturers are developing fully electric VTOLs, a term that stands for "vehicle takeoff and landing" aircraft.
According to the FAA, Alef is not the first plane of its sort to be granted a special airworthiness certificate. Alef, however, said that their vehicle stands apart since it can go on roads and in the air, look like a regular car, and fit into a standard parking spot.
"We're excited to receive this certification from the FAA. It allows us to move closer to bringing people an environmentally friendly and faster commute, saving individuals and companies hours each week. This is one small step for planes, one giant step for cars," Alef CEO Jim Dukhovny stated.
The vehicle's production process began in 2015. Thus, work has been going on it for a while.
With inspiration from the Back to the Future films, four friends--Constantine Kisly, Pavel Markin, Oleg Petrov, and Dukhovny--set out to establish a firm with the goal of creating flying automobiles, CNN reported.
The business claims that a successful autonomous test flight of a stripped-down version of the car was done in 2018 and that a full-scale prototype was flown the following year. Nevertheless, Alef claimed that it could not proceed with the necessary research and development without the FAA's special airworthiness certificate.
