Flying cars
Airbus is one of the leaders in the aircraft industry, and, judging by the recent statement of the head of the A ^ 3 division in the company, very soon their business will go beyond the usual framework of creating aircraft. By the end of the year, the company promises to develop a prototype of a flying car with the hard-to-pronounce name E ^ 3 Project Vahana. The fact that Airbus is working on such a vehicle was said back in February 2016 - and recently the first details about it became known.
© airbus
First, Project Vahana will be electric. This is one of the biggest challenges facing Airbus engineers: they will have to fit enough powerful batteries into the Vahana's hull to provide the car with an acceptable flight time.
Second, Airbus hopes to integrate Project Vahana into the existing infrastructure of traditional vehicles. We are talking, in particular, about car sharing and the ability to call an air taxi using a smartphone.
To make air transport safe, Airbus is developing a special system that will scan the surrounding area around the vehicle and help it avoid collisions.
The project is expected to be officially shown next January at CES.
In addition to Airbus, Uber is also working on a similar vehicle, with plans to make flying cars the next generation of taxis.
Cargo airship
Amazon does a lot of things, from the production of tablets and e-books to the development of artificial intelligence, but the main source of the company's income remains the same - online commerce. Its capabilities are still actively developing: recently, for example, Amazon solemnly reported on the first successful delivery of goods to a customer using a drone.
© USPTO
However, the company is not going to stop there and is preparing something terribly interesting: it received a patent for a kind of "air supply system", which in fact is nothing more than a network of huge airships in the sky over large cities. Each airship is a huge warehouse located at an altitude of over ten thousand meters. When someone places an order, the airship employees find the goods they need and load them onto drones - most likely all the same drones - and they independently deliver them right to the doors of buyers.
Of course, the existence of the patent does not mean that Amazon is doing its best right now to implement its plans. However, given the speed with which the company has introduced drones into its system, we can see the first fruits of its venture with airships in a few years.
"Hyperloop"
They talk a lot about the "Hyperloop", dream - even more, and thinking about the transport of the future, one cannot do without it. Initially, the idea of this vehicle was proposed by Elon Musk: aluminum capsule shuttles with passengers on board move through sealed pipes with low pressure inside at a speed of 1450 km / h. They are gaining gigantic speeds due to special linear accelerators, "arches", located along the route. Each time the shuttle passes through such an "arch", it is accelerated by electromagnetic forces. The entrepreneur, however, said that he did not plan to deal with the project in the near future, but was ready to support anyone who would like to take on it. Those interested were found, and as a result, "Hyperloop" acquired the first test site, and Hyperloop One even announced plans to build a station "Loop" in Moscow, linking it with a station in China.
The ability to cover half a thousand kilometers and get from Los Angeles to San Francisco in half an hour is terribly attractive, but the creation of a full-fledged Hyperloop is still worth questioning. First, the obvious financial issues - the construction of even one route requires huge financial investments (American professor Michael Anderson, for example, voiced the approximate amount of $ 100 billion), and it is not known whether they will be found. Secondly, many issues with the safety of passengers have not been resolved. What if one of the Loop sections fails far from the city? The pipes are sealed, the passengers are actually trapped in a small capsule without windows and doors … Nor does it inspire optimism that the entire network can be brought down by a single terrorist attack.
However, among all possible transport systems of the future, this one looks the most attractive.
Jetpacks
Jetpacks are jetpacks that slip on your back and allow their wearer to fly like that character in a superhero movie. Such devices not only exist - they will even be available for purchase this spring. True, not all of them yet.
JetPack Aviation is the most active developer of "civilian jetpacks". Its latest development, the JB-10, will soon be tested by a civilian for the first time. The video blogger Misha Pollak was chosen as the pioneer of jetpacking. After the training course, he will have to make the first test flight with a jetpack behind his back.
© JetPack Aviation
The JB-10 is able to climb to a height of a kilometer in just a minute, but the fuel supply in its tanks will last only 5-10 minutes. However, the main task of the company is to teach all buyers to drive a vehicle. Now Jetpack Aviation sells its design only a select group of well-trained pilots.
Hoverboards
Almost 30 years have passed since the release of the movie "Back to the Future-2", and hoverboards (flying skateboards) are still there only in the alternative version of 2015 according to Robert Zemeckis. However, just because you can't walk into a store and fly out of there on a futuristic board now doesn't mean the situation won't change in the near future.
The most convincing prototype of the board was, oddly enough, Lexus. In the summer of 2015, the carmaker released a video in which a group of young people effortlessly ride in a seemingly ordinary skate park on a levitating board.
No tricks: the skate really floated above the ground, without breaking any laws of physics. The secret lay in a metal surface hidden under the asphalt pavement in the area. In the board itself, superconductors are installed, located in cryochambers with a temperature of -197 degrees Celsius inside (hence the clouds of steam around the hoverboard). It is they who push the board away from the metal and allow it to levitate.
Unfortunately, such devices are not going to be released for mass sale yet.>
