Meet the Electra Aero EL9, an aircraft that might just revolutionise point-to-point travel

‘The problem with normal fixed-wing aircraft is that they need a long runway to get into the air. And it’s very hard to place that runway anywhere near where people want to go,’ says Diana Siegel, vice president of commercial programmes at Electra.

That’s a Virginia-based company, established in 2019, that reckons it has a solution: it has revisited a technology first proposed in the 1950s to create an aircraft with what it calls ‘Ultra Short’ capabilities, which means it can take off or land within around 60 metres. That opens up many more places where it might operate from, with minimal infrastructure required.

Electra’s two-seater demonstration aircraft, the EL2 Goldfinch, recently landed and took off from a floating helicopter barge off Lower Manhattan in a demonstration of its capabilities. Looking a bit like a typical fixed-wing aircraft, the Goldfinch actually has an awful lot of propellers, eight in all. But it uses these to achieve what’s known as blown lift: put simply, quickly pushing a large sheet of air over the upper surface of a wing, makes the wing perform as though it’s physically much bigger than it actually it, so creating a lot of lift.

This allows the aircraft to get into the air with a relatively short run – an idea explored in 1950s and 60s military aircraft like the Lockheed’s F-104 Starfighter, to compensate for its tiny wings, or the Blackburn Buccaneer, to allow for aircraft carrier-based operations. Blown lift also allows for a very low approach speed, enabling landings over a much shorter distance than a conventional aeroplane.

‘The effect has long been well understood but traditional engine technology just couldn’t [generally] be utilised,’ says Siegel. ‘Imagine trying to place eight turbines or piston engines along a wing – it would be too heavy, too slow’. What has made a functional blown-lift aircraft possible has been the use of a hybrid propulsion system: compact and lightweight electric motors to generate the lift and, critically, evenly distribute it the length of the wing.

For cruising, a nose-mounted, sustainable aviation fuel-burning turbogenerator powers the propellers directly to allow for optimum speed, while simultaneously recharging the batteries. This means that charging facilities aren’t required at landing sites.

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Electra EL9 model

Electra EL9 model

Electra, which recently selected a 96-acre site in Ohio for its production facility, plans to start test-flying its EL9, an aircraft capable of carrying nine passengers, late next year. Siegel says the idea is scalable still further, though she concedes that, while it’s technically possible, by the time you’re talking about getting 100 or more people into a plane it starts to make more logistical sense to use the established airport system.

But why not just take a helicopter? For one, their passenger capacity is limited – at least with current models. But they’re also extremely loud – making them disruptive to more urban environments – and, relative to a fixed-wing aircraft, require much more energy and maintenance. The cheaper-per-seat option of a blown-wing aircraft has, argues Siegel, a huge positive knock-on effect for operating costs, so both increasing the possible variety of use cases and making flying more accessible to more people.

Since the technology also disrupts the hub-and-spoke model that’s long been the standard for commercial airline travel, Electra reckons there are a lot of people who would take up the option to fly point to point in this way. ‘We think it can transform the how we travel over distances that are too long to drive, but too short to make it worth going to an airport,’ says Siegel. ‘We’re not just talking about saving an hour on a driving trip here, but perhaps four hours. You’re not wasting all that time getting to and through an airport’.

Electra’s own analysis reckons that 35m passenger trips occur by car over distances of 50 to 500 miles every day in the US, with 80% of trips between 50 and 265 flying miles lacking a practical air option. It has identified over 6000 routes with at least 1000 travellers per day. And while the company sees its initial growth market as the US – where long drives are the norm – the company believes its concept should also work in any market where there’s a problem between two points: perhaps where there’s typically heavy congestion.

Siegel suggests time could be saved on a journey from London to Oxford, for example, or – with tourism in mind – from London to the Scottish Highlands. She sees a possibility for what she calls a ‘push a button, get a flight’ VIP service in the longer term, although initially Electra’s launch partners are looking to establish scheduled services.

There remains perhaps one final hurdle, Siegel acknowledges, and that’s passenger perception. She says Electra could have pushed the technology further and ended up with an aircraft that looks more radically different but chose to aim for what is more of an evolutionary step on from what passengers are already used to.

And as for how it feels to fly Ultra Short? ‘From the passenger point of view it feels remarkably unremarkable,’ she laughs. ‘It’s rather like riding an elevator. You feel a lot of power beneath you and then you’re just up and away very quickly’.

Electra.Aero, @Electra.Aero