Air transportation is one of the answers to travel in the future. Recently, various innovations offer a one-seater form of eVTOL which stands for electric vertical take-off and landing. This is a radical form of an airplane that can be used as a taxi to travel.

A Japanese company, Tetra Aviation, showed its newest product at the EAA AirVenture event, which took place at Wittman Regional Airport, Wisconsin, United States. The model, named Mk-5, comes with a futuristic design, like a future vehicle seen in sci-fi movies.

The Mk-5 is made of solid and lightweight aluminium and carbon fiber-reinforced polymer (CFRP), which is crucial for future air transport. The size is also relatively compact for an eVTOL 8.5 meters wide, 2.1 meters high, and 6 meters long.

When empty, the Mk-5 weighs 453 kilograms, which is light for an eVTOL size. This aerial vehicle is equipped with 32 vertical rotors mounted on all four sides of the permanent wing and one horizontal thrust at the rear to help it fly through the sky.

In terms of power, the Mk-5 carries a 13.5 kWh battery. This battery can bring this vehicle to fly up to a speed of 160 km per hour with a mileage of 160 km. You can imagine using this eVTOL from your home in Jakarta to go to Bandung without a hitch. Very interesting.

This eVTOL vehicle only accommodates one passenger who will control the aircraft via a joystick and semi-automatic fly-by-wire electrical control. Tetra revealed that the power of the Mk-5 can be carried out by amateur pilots without difficulty to professionals in the field of aviation.

Arguably, the biggest attraction is the fact that the plane is easy to build. That means it's also easier to scale from prototype to mass production. In fact, Tetra Aviation plans to start delivering the Mk-5 as an aircraft package as early as 2022.

However, before achieving this goal, the Tetra team will conduct several flight tests to ensure the Mk-5 works well and has maximum safety. The company is also looking for the necessary regulations to operate this aircraft in several countries.

Day7, last day of #osh21 #AirVenture

We are pre-order now!
Our customer can see our DEMO in CA. pic.twitter.com/b3zA9aqZFb

— teTra aviation corp. / テトラ・アビエーション株式会社 (@teTra_aviation) August 1, 2021

Talking about Tetra Aviation, this company is a pioneer company from Tokyo, Japan, which since 2018 has the ambition to create an eVTOL personal transportation vehicle. Tetra won the Pratt & Whitney Disruptor Award competition in February 2020, where they competed with 854 teams from 103 countries to create future vehicle ideas. Various attractive designs related to space vehicles are shown, such as flying cars, flying motorbikes, hoverboards, jetpacks, to drones that can transport people and personal flyers.

Indonesia itself has several times been acquainted with this flying vehicle. The latest is the giant drone product EHang 216 which uses 16 propellers with 8 foldable arms. This vehicle can fly for 21 minutes with a distance of 35 kilometers and carry 2 adult passengers or weighing 220 kilograms.

The product brought by Prestige Motorcars was introduced at the auto show last April. Some parties are getting interested, but not a few are also doubting the future of the air taxi. There are still many things that need to be addressed related to regulations, infrastructure, security, to air transportation management.