Air taxi in New Zealand

Twelve-rotor, yellow-colored autonomous air taxis are set to be flown on a test drive by American Wisk, a joint-venture between U.S. aircraft manufacturers Boeing and Kitty Hawk. The test drive is planned in New Zealand, where the company also has a site. The small machine is capable of vertical take-off, called a conversion plan.

Working in the small but spectacular segment of passenger transport revolution, Wisk, founded last year, defines itself as a startup in the market, but behind it are large corporations. Aircraft manufacturers Boeing and Kitty Hawk formed the joint venture last December, but actually bought a finished product because a small, two-seater called Cora, an electric, autonomous flight capability, will soon begin test flight.

The project was cherished by Kitty Hawk, who specializes in the development of small electric passenger cars. In 2017, their Cora program received a $ 1 million grant from one of the Pentagon’s military development companies. By then, they already had seven years of experience in vertical takeoff research, or not for them, but for a company called Zee Aero, which was acquired by Kitty in 2018. Cora is over a thousand flight hours.

The 11-meter Cora flies 450 meters above the ground, with a total of 12 rotors on its wings, a plane-rotatable rotor and an additional propeller at the rear. The former helps you take off, the latter helps you move forward. The vehicle has so far been prepared for a mileage of 40 kilometers. For safety reasons, the machine has three independent systems, one of which can be used immediately if the other fails.