Personal aircraft: jetpacks go on sale

The Martin Jetpack was the result of many years of work by Martin Aircraft, led by its founder, engineer Glenn Martin. Jetpack is a device about one and a half meters high and wide and weighing 113 kg. Carbon composites are used to produce the starting material.

The device rises into the air using a 200 hp engine (more than a Honda Accord, for example), which drives two propellers. The pilot, using two levers, can control the aircraft's climb and acceleration. The jetpack can fly non-stop for about 30 minutes, reaching speeds of up to 100 km/h. However, such a unit also consumes much more fuel than a passenger car - about 38 liters per hour. The creators of the device especially emphasize its reliability: the jetpack is equipped with a safety system and a parachute, necessary in the event of an impact during landing or failure of the main engine.

The idea of ​​creating a personal jet device appeared about 80 years ago. The predecessor of the jetpack can be considered the rocket pack, the fuel for which was hydrogen peroxide.

The first devices of this kind, for example, Thomas Moore's jet vest, appeared after World War II and made it possible to lift the pilot above the ground for a few seconds. After this, many years of development began, commissioned by the American armed forces. In April 1961, a week after Yuri Gagarin's flight, pilot Harold Graham made the first ever flight using a personal jet device and spent 13 seconds in the air.

The most successful jetpack model, the Bell Rocket Belt, was invented in 1961. It was assumed that with the help of this device, military commanders would be able to move around the battlefield, spending up to 26 seconds in flight. Later, the military considered the development unprofitable due to high fuel consumption and operational difficulties. Therefore, the device was mainly used in filming films and staging shows, in which unusual flights always caused general delight.

The popularity of the Bell Rocket Belt reached its peak in 1965, when the new Bond film Thunderball was released, in which the famous special agent managed to elude his pursuers from the roof of a castle with the help of such a device. Since then, all sorts of variations of jetpack models have appeared. Soon the first gadget with a real turbojet engine was created - the Jet Flying Belt, which extended the flight to several minutes, but turned out to be extremely bulky and unsafe to use.

The idea of ​​creating his own jetpack came from New Zealander Glenn Martin back in 1981. He also involved his family in the process of creating the device: his wife and two sons. They were the ones who acted as pilots during the first test launches of the device in their family garage. In 1998, Martin Aircraft was founded specifically to develop a new version of the aircraft. Its employees, as well as researchers from the University of Canterbury, helped the inventor achieve the desired result. In 2005, after releasing several trial models, the developers were able to achieve stability of the device during flight - and just 3 years later they successfully carried out the first demonstration flight at an air show in the American city of Oshkosh.

At the beginning of 2010, Martin Aircraft announced the release of the first 500 models, each of which will cost the buyer $100,000. The company believes that with increased production and sales, the jetpack will cost approximately the same as an average car. That same year, Time magazine named the Martin Jetpack one of the best inventions of 2010. Starting sales have already begun - according to the developers, the company has already received more than 2,500 requests.

Due to the light weight of the device, a jetpack pilot does not need a license to fly in the United States (conditions may vary in other countries). However, there is a mandatory training course from Martin Aircraft prior to launch.

“If someone thinks they won’t buy a jetpack unless it’s the size of a school backpack, that’s their right,” Martin says. “But you need to understand that then he will not be able to buy a jetpack throughout his life.”

There is no special system for regulating such air transport in the United States yet, however, according to the creators, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) is developing a project to introduce 3D highways in the sky based on GPS signals.