Flying cars get OK from US air authorities

Remember when you were little and dreamed of getting a flying car? Well strap on your oxygen masks and get ready for takeoff. The FAA has given the OK to the Terrafugia Transition car/airplane.

“See you later, suckos!”, he screamed as he flew over all the traffic on the 405. “I’m not sitting in your s**tshow traffic jams ever again!”

The Transition was designed as a “light sport” aircraft, the smallest kind of private aeroplane under FAA classification, with a maximum weight of 1,320lb. But the manufacturers found it impossible to fit the safety features – airbags, crumple zones and roll cage, for instance – that are required for road vehicles into that weight.

I’m sure I’ll probably never be able to fly over the 405 in my automobile because of air restrictions in Los Angeles but it’s nice to know that at some point I may be able to give the finger to a traffic jam as I fly over it in my car. Well, that is if I can get the $200,000 to buy one. It’s a steep price to pay for never having to sit behind a huge wreck or some old lady that doesn’t understand what a speed limit is. Goodbye Mario Andretti, hello Chuck Yeager.

The two-seater Transition can use its front-wheel drive on roads at ordinary highway speeds, with wings folded, at a respectable 30 miles per gallon. Once it has arrived at a suitable take-off spot – an airport, or adequately sized piece of flat private land – it can fold down the wings, engage its rear-facing propellor, and take off. The folding wings are electrically powered.

And you only need 20 hours of flying time to get a license to fly it. Pretty awesome idea if the FAA figures a way to let them fly low enough as to stay out of airspace designated for actual aircraft. Then you could takeoff and fly wherever you liked without having to worry about restrictions and regulations — it’d be just like driving your car, except you’d be flying it at 115-mph. That’s pretty much twice the average speed limit. Long trips would be cut in half and no more long lines and removing your shoes at the airport.

Hey, it’s not exactly what we had in mind when we thought of flying cars in the 80s, but it’s a step in the right direction.

Terrafugia Transition ‘flying car’ gets go-ahead from US air authorities [Telegraph UK]

--- Did you like this article? And you probably like contests, exclusive content, and smug commentary right? Then why aren't you liking Guyism on Facebook? Show some pride and click the "Like" button below right now: