Sky-High Dreams: Will Lyte's 44-Seat Flying Bus Revolutionize Travel or Just Blow Hot Air?
My dear fellow tech enthusiasts and skeptics - today, let's look into something that's not just big, it's colossal – the Lyte Aviation 44-seat SkyBus. That’s right, forty-four seats in a flying bus! It's like your regular city bus got a jetpack, and a rather ambitious one at that. But before you start thinking - hey, this bird is not electric - read on, because the future is electric.
Now, I've seen plenty of things in my time covering everything from Harley-Davidsons to Hindenburgs, but this, my friends, is a whole new level of audacious. Imagine cruising at a cool 186 mph (300 km/h for the metrically inclined) with 43 of your closest friends, island-hopping without the need for runways. It's either a transportation revolution or an extravagant daydream.
Lyte's design has got this journalist's brow raised, albeit with a smirk. The SkyBus boasts tandem wings adorned with eight six-bladed props – tiny compared to the behemoth they’re supposed to lift. It's like watching a bumblebee fly; it shouldn’t work, but it does, somehow. For vertical takeoffs, these wings swivel to point the props skyward. Once airborne, they shift forward for cruising – a tilt-wing concept that's not new, but never before seen on this scale.
Here's where it gets juicy: the power! We're talking about engines churning out a massive 3,500 to 5,000 horsepower, fed for now by regular jet fuel, soon to be replaced with the sustainable version of it. Plus, a sprinkle of hydrogen fuel cell electric motors for that extra zing. It's like strapping a Tesla to a tank – absurd yet oddly intriguing.
Now - this is where it gets exciting - Lyte plans to switch to clean hydrogen-electric propulsion once it's viable. They're eyeing a full-scale prototype by 2024 and hope to have these behemoths flying by 2025. With a pre-order already in the bag of 10 SkyBuses by India's Vman Aviation Services for a cool $428 million (€400 million), it’s not just pocket change we’re talking about.
But, as with everything EV, let's not get our hopes up too high. The world of VTOLs is littered with ambitious projects that never quite took off. And the world of eVTOL is even trickier. Lyte's journey might be more "The Long and Winding Road'' than "Highway to the Danger Zone."
Despite the skepticism, the concept is intriguing. The SkyBus promises to make regional flights a breeze and transform public transport – a bus in the sky, if you will. Launching the aircraft based on the current jet fuel and with a capacity to an easy and swift upgrade as soon as the new tech is viable, Lyte may have found a decent compromise here. And with Lyte's CEO Freshta Farzam coming from finance rather than aviation, maybe, just maybe, she has the chops to navigate this multi-billion-dollar venture.
We should be watching this one closely, and not because of the SkyBus aircraft falling out of the sky on random occasions. It is the least futuristic solution to the domestic flights conundrum and therefore quite possibly the most achievable one. As much as I am excited about it though, for now I'll stick to my trusty electric bike. It's less likely to leave me stranded in the sky!
Yours truly,
Captain Electro
