BETA Technologies’ ALIA CTOL electric aircraft flies into New York’s JFK Airport, pilot and four passengers on board

BETA Tech­nolo­gies’ ALIA CTOL com­plet­ed a his­toric flight into John F. Kennedy Inter­na­tion­al Air­port (JFK) in New York yes­ter­day (Tues­day), the first time an AAM air­craft has flown into one of the three major air­ports in the New York-New Jer­sey region.

The all-elec­tric aircraft’s his­toric first flight to JFK flew 45 min­utes with a pilot and four peo­ple, includ­ing Matt Koscal, pres­i­dent of Repub­lic Air­ways, and Rob Wiesen­thal, CEO of Blade Air Mobil­i­ty.

The mile­stone flight fol­lows six years of rig­or­ous test­ing and devel­op­ment by BETA and reflects the Port Author­i­ty of New York and New Jersey’s con­tin­ued com­mit­ment to safe­ty and inno­va­tion by advanc­ing next-gen­er­a­tion trans­porta­tion solu­tions.

Kyle Clark, founder and CEO of BETA Tech­nolo­gies, said: “Fly­ing our elec­tric air­craft into one of the world’s busiest air­ports, with pas­sen­gers, proves advanced air mobil­i­ty is not some future con­cept, it’s here.

“Today’s flight is about more than tech­nol­o­gy; it’s about inno­va­tion and con­nect­ing com­mu­ni­ties in safer, qui­eter, and more effi­cient ways. After years of rig­or­ous safe­ty test­ing in all types of envi­ron­ments, we’re proud to stand here with the Port Author­i­ty and the city of New York to demon­strate exact­ly how this air­craft can serve cities by eas­ing con­ges­tion, reduc­ing emis­sions, and increas­ing acces­si­bil­i­ty.”

Wiesen­thal said: “This elec­tric air­craft flight from Long Island to New York City high­lights that qui­et and emis­sion-free flight is quick­ly becom­ing a real­i­ty ben­e­fit­ing Blade’s fliers, local res­i­dents, and oth­er key stake­hold­ers. I can think of no bet­ter way to demon­strate our com­pa­ny’s com­mit­ment to qui­et, elec­tric air­craft com­mer­cial­iza­tion than my par­tic­i­pa­tion on this flight as a pas­sen­ger myself.”

Koscal added: “At Repub­lic, we’re always explor­ing inno­v­a­tive tech­nolo­gies that can help us bet­ter con­nect peo­ple and com­mu­ni­ties — and BETA’s eCTOL rep­re­sents a mean­ing­ful step for­ward in that effort. We’re look­ing for­ward to con­tin­u­ing our engage­ment with BETA as we eval­u­ate how their plat­form might com­ple­ment our train­ing pro­grams and our over­all com­mit­ment to advanced air mobil­i­ty.” 

The demo flight is the result of a request for inno­va­tion (RFI) issued by the agency in 2023 seek­ing pro­pos­als from com­pa­nies to demon­strate their next-gen­er­a­tion air­craft at a Port Author­i­ty air­port.

As part of its agency-wide push to achieve net-zero car­bon emis­sions by 2050, the Port Author­i­ty is com­mit­ted to work­ing with pub­lic and pri­vate part­ners to test clean-ener­gy inno­va­tions that have the poten­tial to improve mobil­i­ty, reduce envi­ron­men­tal impacts, low­er costs and expand access across the region.

Kevin O’Toole, Port Author­i­ty Chair­man, said: “The Port Author­i­ty has long posi­tioned itself as a test­bed for the trans­porta­tion tech­nolo­gies of tomor­row, and this his­toric flight is the lat­est exam­ple of how we’re work­ing to bring inno­va­tion into real-world infra­struc­ture.

“We’re excit­ed about the poten­tial for inno­va­tions like all-elec­tric air­craft to ease region­al trav­el while reduc­ing emis­sions and noise pol­lu­tion. We’re proud to embrace inno­va­tion and help lay the ground­work for a more effi­cient and envi­ron­men­tal­ly friend­ly future of flight.”

Port Author­i­ty Exec­u­tive Direc­tor Rick Cot­ton, added: “This mile­stone flight is direct­ly aligned with the Port Authority’s aggres­sive agen­da to build a more sus­tain­able future and to sup­port the devel­op­ment and roll­out of new tech­nol­o­gy.

“BETA Tech­nolo­gies’ his­toric flight into New York City’s John F. Kennedy Inter­na­tion­al Air­port is a pow­er­ful demon­stra­tion of how Empire State Development’s strate­gic pub­lic invest­ments — includ­ing a mul­ti-mil­lion dol­lar grant to expand BETA’s facil­i­ty at Platts­burgh Inter­na­tion­al Air­port — are pro­pelling pri­vate sec­tor inno­va­tion, envi­ron­men­tal sus­tain­abil­i­ty, and giv­ing flight to par­a­digm-shift­ing indus­tries and tech­nol­o­gy.”

Andrew Kim­ball, pres­i­dent & CEO of New York City Eco­nom­ic Devel­op­ment Cor­po­ra­tion (NYCEDC), said: “NYCEDC is pro­pelling New York City’s tran­si­tion to advanced air mobil­i­ty, lay­ing the ground­work for qui­eter, clean­er and safer skies by upgrad­ing and elec­tri­fy­ing city-owned assets to accom­mo­date elec­tric avi­a­tion.

“Today’s mile­stone flight show­cas­es the tech­no­log­i­cal readi­ness, region­al con­nec­tiv­i­ty, and col­lab­o­ra­tive efforts between mul­ti­ple lev­els of gov­ern­ment and pio­neer­ing com­pa­nies to thought­ful­ly inte­grate sus­tain­able avi­a­tion into our trans­porta­tion sys­tem — dri­ving job cre­ation and eco­nom­ic oppor­tu­ni­ties across the five bor­oughs and beyond, all while pro­vid­ing New York­ers with qui­et skies and clean air they deserve.”

Ear­li­er this year, BETA con­duct­ed a coast-to-coast jour­ney, fly­ing its ALIA CTOL pro­duc­tion mod­el more than 8,000 nau­ti­cal miles from Platts­burgh, N.Y., to Los Ange­les and back.

The com­pa­ny has recent­ly launched a sim­i­lar flight cam­paign through­out Europe, with plans to begin deliv­er­ing air­craft to cus­tomers lat­er this year. BETA also con­duct­ed a demon­stra­tion flight with BETA cus­tomer Blade Air Mobil­i­ty in 2023 out of Westch­ester Coun­ty Air­port (HPN).

In addi­tion to its ALIA CTOL, BETA is pro­duc­ing and cer­ti­fy­ing an elec­tric ver­ti­cal take-off and land­ing (eVTOL) air­craft, ALIA VTOL. This fam­i­ly of air­craft is designed for util­i­ty and effi­cien­cy, with the abil­i­ty to trans­port a pilot and up to five pas­sen­gers or 1,250 pounds of car­go.

The com­pa­ny has also devel­oped a suite of charg­ing solu­tions to enable the emerg­ing AAM indus­try. This includes the charge cube, a fast charg­er com­pat­i­ble with most air taxi man­u­fac­tur­ers and ground sup­port vehi­cles.

BETA pro­duces air­craft and charg­ers in its near­ly 200,000-square-foot pro­duc­tion facil­i­ty in South Burling­ton, Vt., with mul­ti­ple air­craft pro­duced and ready for deliv­ery to cus­tomers. BETA tests flights out of Platts­burgh, N.Y.