First Fully Electric Manned Helicopter Flight

cylonlover writes "On August 12, electrical/aerospace engineer and helicopter pilot Pascal Chretien took to the sky in the world's first untethered, fully electric manned helicopter flight in a prototype machine that he designed and built almost entirely by himself within a 12-month development period. In his 2-minute, 10-second test flight, Chretien beat aviation giant Sikorsky into the record books — but it was not without significant risk. As the man himself puts it: 'in case of crash I stand good chances to end up in kebab form.'"

Comments

Wow....

[RobinEggs]

Major props to this guy.

Ground effect

[bwen]

Not to belittle the achievement- but a height of 1 meter means he never got out of ground effect. It would take a lot more power to really fly. I mean, if a vehicle never goes out of ground effect while flying over water, it can be registered as a boat.

Re:While this is certainly novel and interesting..

[amorsen]

Energy density for lithium air is 18.8MJ/kg, if you have to carry the oxygen with you. Twice that at take off if you use atmospheric air. 9MJ/kg including oxygen has been achieved in the lab. Not 43MJ/kg, certainly, but you are lucky to get a third of that energy out with helicopter engines and the engines or turbines are quite heavy.

Yes, the particular electric helicopter from TFA is all fun and games and doesn't have a future. Nothing wrong with a bit of fun and games.