This Hydrogen Fuel Flying Car Has An Impressive Range Of 400 Miles

Alaka’i, a startup based in Massachusetts, has designed a hydrogren-fuel-powered flying car. The vehicle, in an announcement video, has been marketed by the company as being the “first air mobility vehicle powered by hydrogen fuel cells.” But the most interesting thing here is the promise that the company has made: compared to conventional lithium batteries, the car can have ten times the power and doesn’t affect carbon emissions.

The hydrogen fuel car called Skai has a range of up to 400 miles or 640 km with a maximum flight time of four hours and can carry five people.

It takes the company four years to design the car. By the end of 2020, Alaka’i hopes to receives a certification from the Federal Aviation Administration.

Vertical take-off as well as landing is enabled through six rotors so that the vehicle can fly just like a huge drone. Skai comes with what is called an “Airframe Parachut” which will prevent the vehicle from dropping out of the air in case a propreller failure happens.

Until Alakaí gets all the regulatory and government approvals, Skai is just an ambitious dream. There is another thing to consider is that hydrogen fuel is not easy to obtained in nearly all parts of the world.

Even the company’s CEO, Stephan Hanvey had to admit in an interview that for flying cars to become practical to transport passengers places to places, it would require another ten years.

Even so, using hydrogen to enable flying cars is an exciting vision and a possible alternative to overcome all the limitations of lithium batteries.