Electra’s Ultra Short Hybrid-Electric Aircraft “Welcomed NASA Administrator Bill Nelson Aboard For Flight During HQ Visit”

Elec­tra Aero wel­comed aboard its EL2 Goldfinch Ultra Short pro­to­type hybrid-elec­tric air­craft, NASA Admin­is­tra­tor Bill Nel­son, for a flight dur­ing his recent vis­it to the company’s HQ, reports a press release.

This marked the first ever trip by a U.S gov­ern­ment agency head on a next-gen­er­a­tion Advanced Air Mobil­i­ty (AAM) air­craft. Nel­son expe­ri­enced, first­hand, the aircraft’s unique abil­i­ty to take off and land in soc­cer field-sized spaces to make sus­tain­able point-to-point trav­el a real­i­ty.  

The release explains, “The 24-minute flight on Electra’s two-seat fixed-wing air­craft show­cased its Ultra Short capa­bil­i­ties, com­plet­ing a series of take­offs and land­ings with just 150 ft of ground roll made pos­si­ble by Electra’s pro­pri­etary blown-lift tech­nol­o­gy.” 

Elec­tra Chief Test Pilot Cody Allee (l) and NASA Admin­is­tra­tor Bill Nel­son ® flew from Electra’s head­quar­ters in Man­as­sas, VA (Cred­it: Mark Usci­ak for Elec­tra)

It con­tin­ues, “The flight demon­strat­ed both hybrid-elec­tric and qui­et bat­tery-only oper­a­tions, with an acoustic sig­na­ture of just 55 dB at 500 feet, the equiv­a­lent of a nor­mal con­ver­sa­tion. Elec­tra Chief Test Pilot, Cody Allee, pilot­ed the air­craft dur­ing the Decem­ber 8th flight, depart­ing from Electra’s head­quar­ters at Man­as­sas Region­al Air­port.”

Nel­son enthused, “Fly­ing aboard this new tech­nol­o­gy is an inspir­ing exam­ple of how inno­va­tion and deter­mi­na­tion can rede­fine what’s pos­si­ble in avi­a­tion. Advance­ments in hybrid-elec­tric flight are a crit­i­cal part of the avi­a­tion industry’s trans­for­ma­tion toward clean­er, qui­eter, and more acces­si­ble air trans­porta­tion.”

Marc Allen, Elec­tra CEO, added, “We’re hon­oured to have Admin­is­tra­tor Nel­son expe­ri­ence the ground­break­ing per­for­mance of our pro­to­type air­craft first­hand, and we look for­ward to con­tin­u­ing our col­lab­o­ra­tion with NASA to advance the future of avi­a­tion.”

The release con­tin­ues, “The EL2 Goldfinch serves as a test­bed for Electra’s dis­trib­uted elec­tric propul­sion sys­tem and blown-lift tech­nol­o­gy, which are being scaled up for the company’s nine-pas­sen­ger EL9 Ultra Short air­craft. With more than 2,100 orders already placed for the EL9, Elec­tra is lead­ing the charge to bring sus­tain­able air trav­el clos­er to where we live, work and play.”

Admin­is­tra­tor Nel­son expe­ri­enced Ultra Short take­offs and land­ings with 150 ft of ground roll. (Cred­it: Mark Usci­ak for Elec­tra)

Adding, “Elec­tra was also recent­ly select­ed to devel­op air­craft con­cepts and tech­nolo­gies for next-gen­er­a­tion com­mer­cial air­lin­ers under NASA’s Advanced Air­craft Con­cepts for Envi­ron­men­tal Sus­tain­abil­i­ty (AACES) 2050 ini­tia­tive.”

For more infor­ma­tion

https://www.electra.aero

(Top image: The NASA Admin­is­tra­tor is the first U.S Gov­ern­ment agency head to fly on an AAM air­craft — Cred­it: Elec­tra)

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