Keystone-SDA
Inventor Franky Zapata had to be boring on Friday due to a technical problem before reaching Dover in England. He was trying to cross the sleeve aboard his new flying vehicle, a sort of small helicopter called “Airscooter”.
(Keystone-ATS) The 46-year-old inventor, a former jet ski champion, is nicknamed the flying man after crossing the Channel six years ago aboard a “flyboard”, a feat that he only succeeded in his second attempt.
“We had a little technical concern on a thermal engine, suddenly he preferred to bite, it was a scenario that had been planned in the event of big difficulties,” said Lionel Giorgi, project security manager.
“We have an electric parachute (…) and suddenly he was able to bite” before being recovered by a boat “very quickly and it is healthy and sounds, it is fine,” he added.
Five years of research and development
He had taken off at 3:08 p.m. a few meters from Blériot-Plage, named after the aviator Louis Blériot who had become 116 years ago on the same beach, the very first aviator to cross the Channel. Once he took off, his team gathered behind the control screens, where an almost total silence reigned at the time of the bittering.
“It is a day of celebration, it is the end of five years of intensive research and development,” moved Franky Zapata during a press point before departure, recognizing “a little stress”.
Airscooter, a kind of small helicopter a place with a hybrid engine that can reach the speed of 100 km/h, took off vertically in a large buzz, before quickly gaining speed. A few minutes later, he was only a tiny point on the horizon, in the middle of the sailboats, ferries and ships of the French Navy which crisscrossed the sea.
Implementation in Las Vegas
Franky Zapata started that a few weeks ago flying aboard the 115 kg machine, “developed for the recreational” in his words. Once in the air, it is “only promenade,” he said.
Its ambition is, by early 2026, to set up in Las Vegas, in Nevada (United States), a leisure flight center, open to the general public. According to American regulations, the machine can be used without a pilot license as a “ultralight vehicle”, the company specifies.
“The objective is to make friends, family, the team fly. And then everyone who wants to fly, ”said Franky Zapata.
On August 4, 2019, Franky Zapata reached the English coast in twenty minutes aboard his “flyboard”, a flying board with five mini-turboréactors which allowed him to evolve up to 190 km/h.
