The future of automated vehicles and air taxis sometimes seems very distant but other times it does not seem so remote. That is the case with this brutal video where we see the air taxi take off from Umiles Next, the Integrity Concept.
We all remember the days of fury when Uber, Lyft Didi, and other companies in the industry began to announce their future development projects that marked the potential future of this business.
That is how from one day to the next these companies promised that they would soon make us take a huge leap with vehicles that would not need a driver and large drones capable of transporting passengers.
The latter would involve a lot of regulatory problems with the airspace, but all in all it looked idyllic. Until we saw that it would take much longer than expected.
In that period, multiple companies ended up changing course or readjusting their projects, while many others simply went bankrupt.
However, today we discover that all is not dead, as we see a real flying taxi in action.
Video: this is how the Umiles Next Concept Integrity takes off and moves
The place Aviation Source News shares with us the details of how the aerotaxi of the Spanish company Umiles Next achieved its first test flight through European urban airspace.
The Concept Integrity spacecraft has finally flown over the sky of Toulouse, France, as part of the large-scale flight demonstrations of the TindAIR project, which aims to demonstrate the feasibility of integrating air traffic routes in urban areas.
The video of this test has been shared through the company’s official channel, where yes, it is impressive to see the drone in action, but it is also observed how the regulatory factor is one of the biggest concerns of the project:
The Concept Integrity is the second aircraft developed and piloted by the Spanish firm Umiles Group. The first prototype of this firm was presented in 2019, so a long time had passed when this new model was shown during the celebration of the World ATM Congress in Madrid.
This drone is technically an electric vertical take-off and landing (eVTOL) type ship, with capacity for two people, with automatic flight controls and an autonomous vertical take-off and landing system.
It was a test flight and therefore the capacities of the air taxi are limited, since it can only travel distances of 15 kilometers in a period of just 15 minutes. That’s right, the Concept Integrity travels at one kilometer per minute, or 60 kilometers per hour.
In an urban metropolis environment, that speed could seem low or insufficient for some, but it is an important advance in this field.
Along with the aerotaxi, other unmanned drones were also tested to demonstrate the varieties and possibilities of action in this field pending regulation in greater detail.
But there is a future for this market, that is a fact.