Air taxis will soon be hovering over Singapore’s skies as trials are set to start in 2019.
The Civil Aviation Authority of Singapore (CAAS) revealed on Tuesday (April 9) that initial trials with German company Volocopter will happen within the southern a part of Singapore. Speaking at a press conference at Rotorcraft Asia, CAAS deputy director of transformation programs Tan Chun Wei said it will happen “over the water”.
“We will take off wherever we land. The first phase might be mainly experimental. For starters… we might be over water and might be working with Volocopter on the security points to be certain that even when flying over water, it will not pose a public and even aviation hazard. The landing site might be somewhere within the southern a part of Singapore,” Tan added.
German aerospace startup Volocopter’s air taxis, which is able to soon take to Singapore’s skies, will feature “unprecedented levels of safety,” said chief executive Florian Reuter, with the corporate aiming to start test flights to Singapore within the third quarter of the 12 months.
On Tuesday (April 9), Reuter assured that if any of the important thing components fail, the Volocopter machines will still have the opportunity to “complete their mission” and reach their destination, because of a structure consisting of many components operating independently. .
“To operate these vehicles in cities around the world, we must be as safe as commercial airlines. This is the safety level established for this vehicle,” he said at Rotorcraft Asia (RCA) 2019 and Unmanned Systems Asia (UMSA) 2019 exhibition held on the Changi Exhibition Centre.
Reuters showed some possible future routes that air taxis could use in Singapore. One is a 26km flight from Tuas to the Central Business District and the opposite is an 18km flight from Changi to Sentosa. It also showed potential international routes equivalent to a 26-kilometer route from central Singapore to Johor and a 22-kilometer route from Sentosa to Batam.
The approximate cost of a 20-mile helicopter trip across the United States is $350.
Volocopter’s air taxis can carry a maximum payload of 160 kg and achieve a climb speed of as much as 3 m per second. The maximum flight speed is 100 km/h, and at a cruising speed of fifty km/h the flight time is lower than half an hour.
Source: Channel NewsAsia | Times of the Strait
