Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

Flying Cars Ready To Take Off

Posted by timothy on from the they're-already-late dept.

Ant writes "CBS News has an article, images, and a free streaming video clip of Elwood (Woody) Norris' invention of a working flying machine, AirScooter. He asked one of his test pilots to demonstrate it for 60 Minutes on a hilltop outside San Diego, California. It can fly for 2 hours at 55 mph, and go up to 10,000 feet above sea level. This week, he will receive America's top prize for invention. It's called the Lemelson-MIT award -- a half-million dollar cash prize to honor his life's work, which includes a brand new personal flying machine. Woody Norris' and others' inventions are for NASA's 'The Highway in the Sky.' It is a computer system designed to let millions of people fly whenever they please, and take off and land from wherever they please, in their very own vehicles."

20 of 819 comments (clear)

  1. Headline is wrong by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Funny

    Should say:-

    Flying cars to be made available in fifteen years time

    This is just a sickening attempt to get our hopes up.

    1. Re:Headline is wrong by eclectro · · Score: 4, Funny

      No, it should say;

      Gas prices take off, flying cars left behind.

      --
      Take the cheese to sickbay, the doctor should see it as soon as possible - B'Elanna Torres, "Learning Curve"
  2. Whenever they please? by meringuoid · · Score: 5, Funny
    let millions of people fly whenever they please, and take off and land from wherever they please, in their very own vehicles

    Homeland Security will have a fit!

    --
    Real Daleks don't climb stairs - they level the building.
  3. Hoverboards... by xyronix · · Score: 5, Funny

    I'm still waiting for my hoverboard...
    Fooget Flyin Cars!

  4. big deal... simpsons already did it... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Funny

    wonder if it looks like that hover car on the Simpsons last night... hmm...

  5. Fifteen years is nothing.... by lottameez · · Score: 3, Funny

    If this thing is "real", we're going to need 15 years to get things straightened out so people aren't flying drunk, teenagers aren't racing their air scooters in public air corridors, and Starbucks has a chance to start opening outlets at 10,000 feet.

    --
    Yeah? Well I think you're overrated too.
    1. Re:Fifteen years is nothing.... by bmw · · Score: 5, Funny

      15 years? Try 1500... We've had cars for over 100 years now and we still haven't found a way to keep people from driving drunk and teanagers from racing in public. We probably never will. Now, Starbucks at 10,000 feet... well... there's something that wouldn't surprise me. They've already run out of space on the ground. I know of a place where you can sit in one Starbucks and look out the window across the street at guess what... Another Starbucks!

  6. Quickly . . . by JJ · · Score: 3, Funny

    Buy one now before the air commute becomes congested as well.

    --
    So long and thanks for all the fish . . . !!!
  7. Yeah, but.... by dcigary · · Score: 5, Funny

    ....can it fold up into a briefcase after you land at work?

    --
    ...my Karma ran over your Dogma...
  8. Idea good, math not so good... by DrWhizBang · · Score: 5, Funny

    From TFA

    "...But if we sold say a couple thousand, $50,000 a piece, that's a billion dollars."

    If that's how this guy does math, I think I'll wait for some other manufacturer to create these things before I buy...

    --
    Schrodinger's cat is either dead or really pissed off...
    1. Re:Idea good, math not so good... by DrWhizBang · · Score: 3, Funny

      Apparently in his world, "a couple" = 20.

      Oh, one of those types. I hope he films his "dates".

      --
      Schrodinger's cat is either dead or really pissed off...
  9. Mirror?!? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    I know of a place where you can sit in one Starbucks and look out the window across the street at guess what... Another Starbucks!

    Just curious, this Starbucks doesn't contain remarkably similar looking people to the one you are currently in?

    1. Re:Mirror?!? by macthulhu · · Score: 3, Funny

      Hell yes. Tim Horton is my co-pilot.

      --

      Someday a real rain is gonna come...

  10. Cheap way to get one by aapold · · Score: 5, Funny

    Buy a piece of land. And wait.

    --
    "Waste not one watt!" - CZ
  11. Re:400 feet but it goes to 10k! by Jussi+K.+Kojootti · · Score: 4, Funny
    I thought this was even more frightening:
    NASA says it will draw on modern day satellites and global positioning systems to track the flying vehicles -- to prevent them from bumping into each other.
    Bumping? I know marketing people like to downplay possible problems, but calling aircraft-to-aircraft collision "bumping" is both hilarious and scary.
  12. Re:What about uncommanded rolls? by LiquidCoooled · · Score: 3, Funny

    The release of excriment from the pilots rear end should be enough to balance the vehicle if uncommanded roll begins whilst at altitude.

    --
    liqbase :: faster than paper
  13. Re:public roads by chillmost · · Score: 5, Funny

    Roads? Where we're going, we don't need roads.

    --

    --Residential Interior Design

  14. Re:public roads by Anonymous+Cow+herd · · Score: 3, Funny

    No, this is how GW plans to fix social security... a free flying car beta for everyone over 60 :-)

    --
    Ita erat quando hic adveni.
  15. Answer by Craig_P92669 · · Score: 4, Funny

    DIY surface to air missile systems

    --
    http://xs4.xs.to/pics/04481/p556222.gif
  16. Re:Skycar by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    > Moller has acres and acres of pecan trees, which he eats as a staple of his diet

    He should try just eating the nuts, then he wouldn't need so much space for all those trees.