Regent VICEROY Seaglider Gains “Classification Approval in Principle” from Bureau Veritas

U.S‑Based Regent announced this week it has gained an Approval in Prin­ci­ple (AiP) from Bureau Ver­i­tas Marine & Off­shore for its 12-pas­sen­ger, ful­ly elec­tric, wing-in-ground effect (WIG) Seaglid­er named the Viceroy, reports a press release.

This AiP marks a sig­nif­i­cant cer­ti­fi­ca­tion mile­stone, offer­ing a clear path for the vehicle’s clas­si­fi­ca­tion as a WIG mar­itime ves­sel and the start of com­mer­cial seaglid­er oper­a­tions. Regent cur­rent­ly has a back­log of USD7 bil­lion in pro­vi­sion­al orders for its Viceroy from fer­ry and avi­a­tion oper­a­tors.

The Approval in Prin­ci­ple (AiP) is a val­i­dat­ed third-par­ty tech­ni­cal assess­ment for the seaglid­er com­plet­ed by Bureau Ver­i­tas Marine & Off­shore (BVMO). The AiP is the cul­mi­na­tion of a 10-month long engage­ment between Regent and Bureau Ver­i­tas engi­neers, which includ­ed a series of work­shops encom­pass­ing aspects of the vehicle’s struc­ture, mechan­i­cal sys­tems, avion­ics, propul­sion, and safe­ty sys­tems. Through­out the process, Bureau Ver­i­tas pro­vid­ed pre­lim­i­nary advice with a focus on the ear­ly iden­ti­fi­ca­tion of rules and reg­u­la­to­ry fram­ing for the seaglider’s clas­si­fi­ca­tion.

Regent SeaGlid­er: “Flies like a Pel­i­can, Floats like a Feath­er”

Bil­ly Thal­heimer, co-founder and CEO of Regent, com­ment­ed, “This cer­ti­fi­ca­tion mile­stone is an extreme­ly impor­tant moment for the seaglider’s design and tech­ni­cal matu­ri­ty. The Approval in Prin­ci­ple con­firms we are on an achiev­able cer­ti­fi­ca­tion path towards the com­mer­cial­iza­tion of seaglid­ers.”

He con­tin­ued, “Bureau Ver­i­tas has proven a tremen­dous part­ner in our cer­ti­fi­ca­tion activ­i­ties to date and we are excit­ed to strength­en the rela­tion­ship as we look ahead to the next phase of our design approval process.”

Bil­ly Thal­heimer

And added, “The AiP is to be fol­lowed by a design appraisal process, a series of tech­ni­cal stud­ies which are now under­way that allows the imple­men­ta­tion of the seaglider’s design and oper­a­tion with­out sig­nif­i­cant risk of com­pli­ance or qual­i­fi­ca­tion issues.” BVMO will pro­vide an inde­pen­dent, safe­ty-based cer­ti­fi­ca­tion of the seaglid­er design.

Regent will also be lever­ag­ing the AiP in sup­port of a Design Basis Agree­ment (DBA) with the US Coast Guard, which is expect­ed this Autumn. The AiP and DBA form a clas­si­fi­ca­tion and cer­ti­fi­ca­tion basis with both Bureau Ver­i­tas and the US Coast Guard, sim­i­lar to the G‑1 and G‑2 issue paper used in FAA air­craft cer­ti­fi­ca­tion.

Lau­rent Leblanc, Senior Vice-Pres­i­dent, Tech­ni­cal & Oper­a­tions, Marine and Off­shore of Bureau Ver­i­tas, remarked, “Our work with seaglid­ers has been an oppor­tu­ni­ty for Bureau Ver­i­tas to fur­ther share and devel­op our exper­tise in new sys­tems and tech­nolo­gies includ­ing elec­tric propul­sion sys­tems, high-speed hydro­foils, and dig­i­tal fly-by-wire con­trol sys­tems whilst also assess­ing the safe­ty of these sys­tems.”

Lau­rent Leblanc

Bureau Ver­i­tas is one of the world’s lead­ing clas­si­fi­ca­tion soci­eties with over 190 years of review­ing and approv­ing nov­el seago­ing ves­sels such as Regen­t’s seaglid­ers. This AiP marks an impor­tant mile­stone for the com­pa­ny before it com­mences ser­i­al pro­duc­tion of the new ves­sel.”

For more infor­ma­tion

https://www.regentcraft.com/