Capitalize on Paris 2024. Promoters still hope to experiment with electric flying taxis during the Paris Olympic and Paralympic Games this summer, but are now aiming for certification of their machines “in the fall” by European authorities, they announced on Wednesday.
The manager of Paris airports, Groupe ADP, joined forces in this project with the Ile-de-France region and the German company Volocopter, which manufactures the “Volocity”, a two-seat aircraft (including the pilot’s seat). ), equipped with batteries powering 18 rotors arranged in a ring above the cockpit. The aim is to take advantage of the Olympic showcase to demonstrate the feasibility of this new mode of transport, supposed to connect different take-off and landing sites, “vertiports”.
“We have developed five vertiports (including) four which are already in operation” – the Paris-Charles-de-Gaulle and Bourget airports, the Issy-les-Moulineaux heliport to the southwest of Paris and the Saint-Cyr-l’École aerodrome near Versailles – explained Edward Arkwright, executive general director of ADP. The fifth site, a barge on the Seine near Austerlitz, has yet to receive the green light from the Ministry of Transport, but “it is ready, moored, positioned”, added Edward Arkwright, interviewed on the sidelines of the VivaTech technology fair in Paris.
To be able to carry paying passengers, the Volocity will need to obtain certification from the European Aviation Safety Agency (EASA). Volocopter had previously hoped for this before the Olympics. “It’s an aeronautical program, so we know that it’s complex,” explained Jean-Christophe Drai, Volocopter manager for France: “Sometimes, we discover things as we move forward. So yes, it was a little bit off. We maintain the objective (…) of obtaining this certification in the fall.” “We will not have paying passengers during the Olympic and Paralympic Games. But our goal remains to have a paying passenger before the end of the year,” insisted Edward Arkwright.
Even without appropriate certification from the EASA, the Volocity can be authorized to carry out demonstrations with the only pilot on board, or even to also carry a non-paying observer, Volocopter CEO Dirk Hoke explained earlier this year. While many municipal elected officials in Paris, from the majority or the opposition, have expressed their hostility to these devices, judging them in particular to be elitist, ADP and its partners insist on the interest of Volocity – which will be developed in more sophisticated versions. large – for emergency medical transport, whether patients or transplants.
