Electra Unveils Design “for EL9 Ultra-Short Hybrid-Electric Aircraft”

U.S‑based Elec­tra Aero has unveiled this week, its design “of the ground­break­ing EL9 Ultra Short hybrid-elec­tric prod­uct air­craft”, a nine-pas­sen­ger pilot­ed air­craft built for the elec­tric future “that rede­fines air trav­el with­out air­ports, emis­sions, or noise,” reports a press release.

The design was pre­sent­ed at Electra’s HQ in Man­as­sas, Vir­ginia, to an audi­ence of more than 300 guests, includ­ing lead­ers from the aero­space indus­try, part­ners, cus­tomers, gov­ern­ment offi­cials, media and friends. Elec­tra now enters its devel­op­ment phase, after a year or more of suc­cess­ful flight test­ing the EL2 Goldfinch two-seat pro­to­type.

The hybrid-elec­tric propul­sion sys­tem of the EL9 with blown lift tech­nol­o­gy, “enables ultra-short take­offs and land­ings in soc­cer field-size spaces pre­vi­ous­ly lim­it­ed to heli­copters and eVTOLs, but at one-third the cost and with the improved safe­ty and reli­a­bil­i­ty of a fixed-wing air­craft,” says the release. “This unlocks thou­sands of new loca­tions for direct air ser­vice, includ­ing small region­al air­ports or uncon­ven­tion­al sites like grass fields or park­ing lots, offer­ing seam­less point-to-point region­al con­nec­tiv­i­ty for both pas­sen­gers and car­go.” 

This air­craft oper­ates with far low­er emis­sions and noise than con­ven­tion­al planes, while its hybrid-elec­tric pow­er sys­tem pro­vides extend­ed range and inflight bat­tery recharg­ing, with no ground charg­ing sta­tions required.

Marc Allen, CEO of Elec­tra, com­ment­ed, “This air­craft is more than a new design. It’s the gate­way to a clean­er, qui­eter and more afford­able future for region­al trav­el.”

He con­tin­ued, “With the EL9, we’re not just mak­ing sus­tain­able avi­a­tion a real­i­ty, we’re redefin­ing how peo­ple and car­go move through ‘Direct Avi­a­tion’, a new cat­e­go­ry of safe and seam­less trav­el that brings air mobil­i­ty clos­er to where we live, work and play.”

The aircraft’s blown lift tech­nol­o­gy com­bines with dis­trib­uted elec­tric propul­sion using four inde­pen­dent bat­tery packs and a small tur­bine-pow­ered gen­er­a­tor that dri­ves eight elec­tric motors dis­trib­uted along the wing to pro­vide high lift at low air­speeds. 

Marc Allen

The EL9 can take off and land in as short a space as 150 ft, and cruis­es at 175 knots. The release con­tin­ues, “With range and pay­load to fly mis­sions that mat­ter, the air­craft will car­ry nine pas­sen­gers with bag­gage or 3,000 pounds of car­go for 330 nau­ti­cal miles, and has a max­i­mum fer­ry range of 1,100 nau­ti­cal miles with IFR reserves.”

It adds, “It will be cer­ti­fied for IFR and flight into known icing con­di­tions. While the EL9 will be equipped with two pilot crew sta­tions, Electra’s Safe Sin­gle Pilot tech­nol­o­gy with fly-by-wire con­trols will enable ease of pre­ci­sion land­ings for a sin­gle pilot.”

Elec­tra has over 2,100 orders for the air­craft from 52 oper­a­tors world­wide, rep­re­sent­ing more than USD8 bil­lion in mar­ket val­ue. The first trail flights are planned for 2027, with cer­ti­fi­ca­tion and ser­vice entry antic­i­pat­ed in 2029 under FAA Part 23 reg­u­la­tions.

For more infor­ma­tion

https://www.electra.aero

(Top Image: Graph­ic of Elec­tra EL9) 

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