When Future Gets Closer – Flying Cars

“Mark my word: A combination airplane and motorcar is coming. You may smile, but it will come.” - Henry Ford, 1940



As a kid, when I watched Jetsons, I used to make a fuss with my mother over the flying car that I saw on TV. And my mother always said that there was nothing like a flying car and every thing about it was just hypothetical.

I pondered and pondered and pondered about what the word hypothetical meant. When I started to learn new big words, I understood that a hypothetical concept was basically an assumption that had to be proved and verified. And then, I again started to wonder about the flying car that I saw in Jetsons. I convinced myself that it was practically impossible.

But that was way back in 1995 or something. The year is 2015 now, and one day I happened to stumble upon a video of a flying car on YouTube. It took me back to the good old times when I argued with my mother about Jetsons' flying car. “But wait. What did I just see? A teaser for a flying car? Is that real?” A series of questions started bombarding my consciousness, until I felt myself flying. Yes, it is real. The flying car is not going to be a futuristic hypothetical concept anymore. The future is near. Somewhere in 2017. Because, that is when the flying car from AeroMobil is going to be launched officially. And Henry Ford's forecast is about to be true to its word.



The Slovakian manufacturer AeroMobil had lifted the veils off the prototype of the futuristic flying car which featured an elongated car with wings that can be stacked into its body when not required. The car, which the company claims to be efficient in finding its way easily through the traffic on roads and in airspace, would be the world's first flying roadster. “We are now scaling up quite fast, building the team, and the plan is that in 2017 we’ll be able to announce… the first flying roadster. The point is not only to showcase that it’s possible to marry together a plane and a car, but to really commercialize it,” said Juraj Vaculik, the Co-Founder and CEO of the company.




The flying car, which is to be known as the AeroMobil 3.0, is a two-seater vehicle that has been made of advanced composite material, which helps the vehicle being as light-weight as a plane, to ease the process of flying without facing any other issues. The AeroMobile has the size of any normal car and can be fit into any regular parking space. But being a plane as well, the vehicle gets access to take-off and land using a surface of a few hundred metres in length just like a runway, at any airport in the world. Moreover, the car comes equipped with avionics equipment, autopilot and advanced parachute deployment system and other advanced technology, embedded in the steel framework body with carbon coating, such as variable angle of attack of the wings. The quadcopter feature would facilitate the car to rise directly towrds the sky and find its way out, while being stuck in the traffic. How I wish that all the cars in the world had wings! Traffic would not have been a world crisis anymore!



This flying car would be powered by the Rotax 912 engine which is capable of achieving a top speed of more than 200 kmph on air, and a take off speed of 130 kmph. The rate of fuel consumption is 15 litres per hour. On road, it is capable of hitting a top speed of over 160 kmph with a fuel consumption rate of 8 litres per 100 km.

For those thinking of getting their hands on one of these rare pieces, start saving some real good amount of money as this AeroMobil would cost you the price of a sports car, a Light Sports Aircraft along with several hundreds of thousands of Euros, for a single piece. So, for me, I guess I better continue to perceive this concept as hypothetical rather than thinking of buying it at this cost.