Jam-packed airport traffic and crowded airports can be a giant time-suck for busy travelers. What if you don’t need an airport and you can land and take off from your own front yard? Get ready for a light jet that will transport you door-to-door: VTOL- a vertical take-off and landing plane. The aircraft could pick up passengers at their homes or hotels, and fly them more than 1,000 miles. It can hover like a helicopter and fly fast and high like a jet.
It’s not totally new as military planes have been taking off and landing vertically for decades. Now, a new era of hovering, commercial airplanes is dawning, according to Jeffrey Pino, vice chairman at Denver-based XTI Aircraft. He says ‘VTOL, true point-to-point travel, has got to be inevitable.’
XTI Aircraft founder David Brody is leading an elite team of aviation experts including Charlie Johnson, former president of Cessna Aircraft, Jeff Pino, former president of Sikorsky Aircraft, Dennis Olcott, former chief engineer at Piper and Adam Aircraft. The team has been developing the XTI TriFan 600, a conceptual three-rotor vertical takeoff and landing airplane which is now in the early developmental stage. The experts are planning to build the first commercially certified, high-speed, long-range airplane capable of vertical takeoff and landing.
The TriFan 600 has capacity for five passengers and a pilot. The aircraft features three ducted fans powered by two gas-turbine engines which allow the plane to fly higher and faster than other types of VTOLs. The TriFan 600 uses newer technologies including carbon fiber and other lightweight construction materials, electronic control systems and engines that are smaller, more powerful and efficient.
Once the TriFan is airborne, the two wing-mounted fans rotate to provide forward thrust. The two jet engines can reach a combined 2,600 horsepower, the XTI team claims. With all that power the craft can reach a top speed of 400 mph and an altitude of 30,000 feet.
The plane has the design of a luxe private jet, the helicopter’s ability to lift off vertically and maneuver with flexibility, and the plane’s ability to travel long distances at great speeds, all those combined is making it ideal for tourism and medical evacuations.
The company hopes to raise $50 million USD to bring that idea to realization. They say the TriFan 600 would be available to the public for about $10 million USD a plane.