Dubai: Dubai’s ambitious plan of having the world’s first automated aerial taxis (AAT) is heading towards reality with a new video giving people a glimpse of how the AAT will work.
The video was tweeted this morning by Dubai Media Office, showing how the AAT will revolutionise mobility in the emirate.
The Roads and Transport Authority (RTA) announced last month that it has signed an agreement with German firm Volocopter, which specialises in manufacturing Autonomous Air Vehicles (AAV).
Expected to begin trials later this year, the two-seater AAT will undergo test flights and safety checks for the next five years allowing RTA and Dubai Civil Aviation Authority (DCAA) enough time to jointly come up with rules and regulations for the new transport system.
The video demonstrates how the AAT will transport passengers from one part of the city to the another without any human intervention or the need for a flight licence.
Capable of achieving the top airspeed of 100kph, the AAT will have a maximum continuous flight time of 30 minutes, with an average cruising speed of 50kph.
Powered by electricity, the AAT will be equipped with 18 rotors and nine independent battery systems which can be charged within 40 minutes.
The AAT also has multiple redundancy in all critical components such as propellers, motors, power source, electronics and flight controls, apart form having a full aircraft emergency parachute.
According to the video, the new mobility system will reinforce Dubai’s image as the city of the future.
The move also echoes Dubai’s Smart Autonomous Mobility Strategy that seeks to transform a quarter of the total trips in Dubai into autonomous transport by 2030.
Earlier this year the authority announced the trial run of a pilotless aerial vehicle by July in collaboration with a Chinese firm Ehang, however, details of progress on that project is not yet available.
