ELECTRA AERO unveils full-scale technology demonstrator
Future Flight|August 2023
On 12 June 2023, Electra unveiled the newly completed test vehicle by which it intends to vet its hybrid-electric Short Take-Off and Landing (eSTOL) platform. The event marked a significant milestone in the company's stated mission of helping decarbonise aviation and revolutionise urban and regional transportation.
ELECTRA AERO unveils full-scale technology demonstrator

Founded in 2020 with the goal of decarbonising aviation and bringing air transportation to every part of the world, Manassas, Virginia-based Electra. Aero (Electra) is staffed by experts and collaborators formerly of Boeing, Airbus, MIT, Pilatus, HondaJet and Aurora Flight Sciences. The test-aircraft rolled out of Electra's development facility at Manassas, Virginia's Manassas Regional Airport during a ceremony attended by guests representing the aviation industry, government, the investor community, and Electra customers.

Imaginatively dubbed the Electra Model EA-2 Goldfinch, in celebration of the songbird indigenous to Virginia the bright-yellow aircraft makes use of a distributed-electric, blownlift propulsion scheme by dint of which it is capable of taking-off and landing over very short distances. Electra's powertrain comprises a hybrid-electric architecture that internally recharges a collection of high-power battery packs which, in turn, energize a turbogenerator that powers eight electric motors and their respective rotors. Subject motor-rotor assemblies provide both forward thrust and induced lift over the aircraft's braced, high-wing, thereby occasioning the STOL capability denoted in the machine's designation.

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