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X-Hawk Fancraft Like Blade Runner Flying Car?
The X-Hawk is an interesting vertical-takeoff-and-landing (VTOL) aircraft under development in Israel. Rafi Yoeli hopes to market his X-Hawk by 2010.
(X-Hawk Fancraft VTOL aircraft)
The Fancraft is the military version of the X-Hawk aircraft. It would be used primarily as a troop carrier. The X-Hawk team is working with Textron's Bell Helicopters to try to bring the Fancraft version to market.
Yoeli sees the X-Hawk as being more like a futuristic "truck" (as opposed to a flying car); X-Hawk could land vertically and take off with people in trouble, or ferry troops and rescue workers into problem areas.
“I do believe that the X-Hawk is more than a business opportunity,” says Yoeli. “I see this as the forerunner to a new family of vehicles. Our vision is that there is a clear need for a craft that can operate in confined areas, particularly urban environments, to take people out of harm’s way and in some cases into harm’s way for certain missions.“It is a craft that would be able to fly below rooftop level, in situations that are currently incompatible with existing platforms.”
Readers have remarked on the similarity between the X-Hawk Fancraft and the flying police cars from the 1982 movie Blade Runner directed by Ridley Scott.
(Blade Runner car from underneath)
See more pictures of the flying car from Blade Runner. Read a bit more at Flying car seen as solution for rescue and X-Hawk: revolutionary, modular VTOL aircraft. Thanks to Zac Hunter for pointing this one out.
Scroll down for more stories in the same category. (Story submitted 2/6/2007)
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