Airbus to introduce autonomous planes

The future of flights as predicted by Airbus will certainly be pilotless aircrafts, bespoke air cabins and flying electric vehicles.

The international pioneer in aerospace industry, Airbus described on Thursday that in future the skies would be bustling with novel flight types.

At the RISE tech conference held in Hong Kong, the chief technological officer Paul Eremenko informed that the European plane-maker is already analyzing what it names as ‘module’ cabin concept – a notion that passenger planes being personalized to various demands.

Eremenko stated, “You can imagine on a flight to Vegas, you might have a casino module. Or in a more general sense, you may have a sleeping module and you go and pay 50 bucks an hour to have the ability to sleep in a sound-proof, climate-controlled area.”

As Phys.org reported, Airbus had already been working on his project for one year also including the user trials. Apart from this, Airbus has also been working of self-piloted autonomous flying car known as the Vahana. The testing on a full-size prototype is expected to be conducted by the end of 2017.

“Our goal really is to open up the third dimension in cities and we believe that the time is right,” exclaimed Eremenko.

He believed that the increase in mega-cities, rising congestion and technological advancements are major aspects of fueling the advancements of electric short-hop flight travel. Downplaying the safety fears, Eremenko said that pilotless flights are also liable to happen.

“We believe the first autonomy will come in the domain of urban air mobility where the vehicles are smaller and there are fewer occupants.”

Eremenko claimed that it was easier to fly autonomously rather that to drive autonomously. “That, I have fairly high confidence that we will get to in single-digit years.”

He added that the issue restraining to make this a possibility is not technical one but is of social acceptance, reported The Economic Times.