Vertiflite May/June 2021

THE VERTICAL FLIGHT SOCIETY Electric VTOL News

Here’s our roundup of news on electric and hybrid-electric vertical takeoff and landing (eVTOL) aircraft from our Electric VTOL Newsletter and website: www.eVTOL.news. More than 440 eVTOL aircraft have been catalogued to date, with new aircraft added after every unveiling. Check out eVTOL.news for more information or to subscribe to our newsletter. Heaviside for Emergency Use On Feb. 24, emergency response and healthcare company Falck announced a collaboration with Kitty Hawk to consider its high-performance, single-seat Heaviside eVTOL for emergency response operations. As of that date, Kitty Hawk had built 13 Heaviside prototypes and made more than 700 test flights, primarily unmanned. With Heaviside, Falck said it “plans to test and evaluate new technologies on a large scale, making emergency healthcare more accessible and affordable.” Falck said it expects to introduce Heaviside in collaboration with customers in its home country, Denmark, followed by the United States. This new effort adds to Falck’s drone initiative, Vertical, which aims to assess the potential of drone technology in the prehospital and ambulance services of the future.

type certificate application in December 2020 to CAAC, which accepted it the following month.

Volocopter Spreads its Wings in China, Too

EHang Spreads its Wings in China

In March, the eVTOL.com website broke the news that Bruchsal, Germany-based Volocopter GmbH had submitted a patent application in May 2020 for a tandem-winged multicopter. In addition to the two pairs of wings, with three three-bladed lifting propellers on each side, a low-set tailplane features a pair of tractor propellers for forward flight. The article noted that the past decade of development at Volocopter has focused on a very simple multicopter design. “Since 2018, however, a small team within Volocopter has focused on a winged, lift-plus-cruise design — depicted in the above patent application that was published in December — that would deliver greater range to address other potential markets. The vast majority of the company’s resources and talent remain focused on the VoloCity, which Volocopter believes will address 60 percent of the urban air mobility [UAM] market, and that is not expected to change for the next five years.” Meanwhile, on March 3, Volocopter announced it had raised an additional $241M ( € 200M) in an “oversubscribed” Series D funding round, bringing its total capital raised to $390M ( € 322M). The funding will be used to bring its two-seat VoloCity air taxi to certification and accelerate the launch of its first commercial routes. Chinese automaker Zhejiang Geely Holding Group, an early investor in Volocopter (and owner of Terrafugia, as well as Volvo and Lotus), plans to bring Volocopter’s air taxis to China. According to ThePaper.cn website, the CEO of Geely’s general aviation subsidiary, Wofei Changkong Technology Co. (also translated as Aerofugia), said that operations in China could begin in 2024 under a joint venture between the two companies (controlled by Wofei Changkong), with China’s CAAC accepting Volocopter’s airworthiness certificate from the European Union Aviation

After many months of rumors and speculation, Guangzhou, China-based EHang acknowledged in a tweet on March 9, “EHang has been developing long-range electric vertical take-off and landing (eVTOL) vehicle for years. We are about to run the test flight of this new product in months, which will have many new breakthrough features. We will release more information in time.” This was reiterated on April 14 with a tweet, “We’re pleased to announce that EHang will perform trial flights of a new passenger-grade eVTOL with flight range of more than 300km [186 miles] on May 25. A big step closer of becoming a UAM solution provider. Stay tuned!” Late last year, drawings (such as that shown) began circulating, which allegedly depict this longer-range EHang eVTOL. Meanwhile, the company announced on April 16 that the Civil Aviation Administration of China (CAAC) has established a type certification team for the company’s EH216 air taxi. The kickoff meeting was held in Guangzhou on April 13–14 with the aim to advance the type certification approval of the EH216. EHang officially submitted the EH216

May / June 2021

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