New Zealand & Flying Electric Cars

Google founder, Larry Page's pilotless flying car unveiled: The Kitty Hawk Cora air taxi, that could become an 'Uber for the skies' by 2021

·      In 2016, Page invested in a company called Kitty Hawk, which is developing the Cora flying car 

·      Kitty Hawk said it is working with the New Zealand government to commercialize its flying cars

·      Once airborne, a single rear propeller pushes Cora through the air at speeds of up to 110 mph (180 kph)

·      It is designed to use self-flying software, which controls its 12 fans to provide lift-off and forward thrust

Kitty Hawk have developed a small, electric aircraft called Cora, which flies horizontally like an airplane but has the capability to take off and land vertically.

"Cora is self-piloting, which means that to get where you need to go, you don't need a pilot's license," says Eric Allison, Kitty Hawk's vice president for engineering. Cora can fly up to 110 miles per hour and has a range of 62 miles.

Kitty Hawk have reached a deal with the New Zealand government to develop an air taxi service to operating the Cora electric jet, and the company hopes to launch the service in as few as three years.

Federal Aviation Administration rules would have made it difficult to get a project like this off the ground in the United States. New Zealand has a thoughtful and safety-conscious regulatory regime, that will allow this type of project to take to the skies sooner than elsewhere in the world. Hopefully this will inspire other nations to follow.

The Cora has multiple propellers, making the vehicle safer and more stable, and it also makes it easier to design vehicles with vertical takeoff and landing (VTOL) capabilities. But it's difficult for a human pilot to control an aircraft with multiple propellers, so sophisticated software is needed to make a vehicle like this work.

And of course, once you have software controlling significant aspects of a flight, it's not much of a leap to build a fully self-flying aircraft that people can ride in with little or no experience piloting an aircraft.

The current 62 mile short-range flights is limited by the battery, but as technology develops I am sure we will see a lot longer ranges and speeds on these type of new flying machines. For the time being the Kitty Hawk Cora will be useful to quickly move people around within a metropolitan area—for example, flying from San Jose to San Francisco or Baltimore to Washington DC.

Fabrizio Poli is an independent aviation consultant specialized in aircraft sales. He is also an accomplished Airline Transport Pilot having flown both private Jets and for the airlines. Fabrizio is also a bestselling author and inspirational speaker & has been featured on Russia Today (RT), TRT World, Social Media Examiner, Bloomberg, Channel 5, Chicago Tribune, Daily Telegraph, City Wealth Magazine, Billionaire.com, Wealth X, Financial Times, El Financiero and many other Media offering insight on the aviation world. Fabrizio is also regularly featured as an Aviation Analyst on Russia Today (RT) and TRT World. Fabrizio is also aviation special correspondent Most Magazine. Fabrizio is also considered one of the world's top 30 experts in using Linkedin for business. You can tune in weekly to Fabrizio's business Podcast Living Outside the Cube available both in video & audio. You can also follow Fabrizio's aviation videos on Biz Jet TV  Fabrizio's latest book "Health4Flyers", the first natural-health book for and frequent flyers is now available worldwide.

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