Tag: Advanced Air Mobility

Aviation Week’s Check 6 Podcast: Beyond The Hype—What’s Happening With Air Taxis

In Aviation Week’s most recent Check 6 Podcast, “Beyond The Hype—What’s Happening With Air Taxis,” Aviation Week Managing Editor Ben Goldstein is joined by Aviation Week editors Graham Warwick and Jens Flottau, as well as Sergio Cecutta, founder and partner at SMG Consulting, to discuss “the progress underway in the fast-growing advanced air mobility industry.”
Listen to Podcast (Aviation Week)

Embraer’s Eve Unveils First Air Taxi Prototype

Flying Magazine reports, “Eve Air Mobility, the electric vertical takeoff and landing (eVTOL) air taxi subsidiary of Embraer, this week joined a select group of eVTOL manufacturers. At the Farnborough International Airshow in the U.K., Eve unveiled its first full-scale eVTOL air taxi prototype, assembled at Embraer’s test facility in Brazil’s São Paulo state.”
Full Story (Flying Magazine)

Eve Air Offers Preview on Progress in Building its eVTOL Prototype

Aviation International News reports, “Eve Air Mobility this week released still images and video giving glimpses of what it says is progress in building the first full-scale example of the four-passenger eVTOL aircraft it aims to bring to market in 2026. The airframe is now being assembled at a new facility at Taubaté in Brazil’s São Paulo state, but the company has not provided an update as to when it will be ready to start test flights.”
Full Story (Aviation International News)

Eve Air Mobility Brands UATM Solution ‘Vector’

Aviation Week reports, “Eve Air Mobility has chosen the name Vector for its in-development urban air traffic management (UATM) solution, with first deliveries now planned for 2026.” The Embraer spinoff is “the only major air taxi OEM that is also developing a UATM solution, considered critical to enabling high-density operations of drones and electric vertical-takeoff-and-landing (eVTOL) vehicles.”
Full Story (Aviation Week)

NASA, DARPA, Sikorsky Design Air Taxi Software

ExecutiveGov reports that NASA is working with DARPA and Sikorsky “to develop and test autonomous software designed for future self-flying air taxis.” NASA said the research is “led by NASA’s Advanced Air Mobility program, which aims to take transportation to new heights by innovating passenger and freight flights in dense traffic environments and other scenarios.” AAM’s mission is “to ensure a safe, accessible, automated, yet affordable air transport in hard-to-reach urban and rural areas.” The three organizations “are currently designing software using scripted flight paths as well as customized test tablets and ground control room simulations to understand the technology’s behavior and response to air-to-air encounters.” The software will eventually “be installed and tested on Sikorsky’s modified S-76B helicopter, labeled the Autonomy Research Aircraft, and its Optionally Piloted Vehicle Black Hawk helicopter.”
Full Story (ExecutiveGov)

Is an ‘Industry Killer’ Coming for Advanced Air Mobility?

Aerospace America reports that among the proposed rules “in the United States for the coming class of electric air taxis is one that is striking a particularly sour note for backers of these vertical lift aircraft.” The Federal Aviation Administration’s proposed Special Federal Aviation Regulation, or SFAR, “would require the operators of electrical vertical takeoff and landing aircraft to maintain 30 minutes of reserve power beyond their planned flight times during the day and 45 minutes of reserve power during the night.” The FAA’s caution is “rooted in the long-standing practice that conventionally fueled fixed-wing passenger aircraft must be loaded with enough fuel to fly to the nearest airport in the event of a technical problem en route to a destination.” The reserve rule for eVTOLs and other rules in the SFAR “remain in a legally required comment period that runs through Aug. 14.” Vertical Flight Society Director of Strategy Mike Hirschberg said, “If you have a 45-minute reserve requirement, then your total flight time is zero. That is an industry killer. If that becomes a requirement, there will be no advanced air mobility.”
Full Story (Aerospace America)