Sounds Air is looking replace small aircraft, on shorter regional routes, with electric powered aircraft. Notes that maintenance costs will be far less than conventional gas and jet powered aircraft.
The Climate Change Commission wants electric planes on regional routes by 2030. It may happen much sooner.
Source: Electric passenger aircraft on the horizon for regional routes, aviation industry says | Stuff.co.nz
For short flights of 100 to 500 miles with 9 passengers.
Ravn Alaska said it will buy 50 electric planes from the California-based company Airflow when they come onto the market. Airflow’s planes will use batteries instead of gas to power their engines.But first, the company has to finalize its aircraft design. Airflow CEO Marc Ausman said he hopes to have Airflow’s planes ready for service by 2025.
Source: Ravn Alaska to purchase fleet of electric aircrafts – Alaska Public Media
“United Airlines Ventures (UAV) announced today it, along with Breakthrough Energy Ventures (BEV) and Mesa Airlines, has invested in electric aircraft startup Heart Aerospace. Heart Aerospace is developing the ES-19, a 19-seat electric aircraft that has the potential to fly customers up to 250 miles before the end of this decade. In addition to UAV’s investment, United Airlines has conditionally agreed to purchase 100 ES-19 aircraft, once the aircraft meet United’s safety, business and operating requirements. Mesa Airlines, United’s key strategic partner in bringing electric aircraft into commercial service, has also agreed to add 100 ES-19 aircraft to its fleet, subject to similar requirements.”
At the present time, this technology is for relatively short haul, small regional flights. Am not yet seeing a path forward for continental spanning or international flights in large, electrically powered aircraft. Some think this may be solved with hydrogen-fueled aircraft (but hydrogen has a low energy density).
The World Health Organization has said that travel restrictions are not effective saying they may work, briefly, to slow the spread within the first few weeks, but otherwise do not work.
So of course, nations put up often porous travel restrictions.
I watched a Youtube video where a couple wanted to drive their RV to Alaska, via Canada. Per the US State Department, Americans are prohibited from entering Canada – except for a class of “essential” persons.
So one of the two took a short summer job in Alaska. Then, they could cross the border into Canada, and drive to Alaska, work for a bit, and then spend the summer touring Alaska in their RV.
Face plant.
Canadians can fly to and from US destinations but Americans who are non-essential and worthless are not permitted to enter Canada.
In the case of Mexico, land border crossings are closed to most – but Americans may fly to and from Mexico destinations. This makes sense, how?
Last updated: June 21, 2021
COVID-19 Related Travel Restrictions across the U.S. Borders with Canada and Mexico
- The United States will temporarily limit inbound land border crossings from Canada and Mexico to “essential travel”.
- This action does not prevent U.S. citizens from returning home.
- These restrictions are temporary and went into effect on March 21, 2020. They will remain in effect through 11:59 pm on July 21, 2021. This decision has been coordinated with the Governments of Mexico and Canada.
- The following categories do not fall within the definition of “essential travel:”
- Individuals traveling for tourism purposes, such as sightseeing, recreation, gambling, or attending cultural events in the United States.
- Who is considered an “essential” traveler?
- Citizens and lawful permanent residents returning to the United States.
- Individuals traveling for medical purposes (e.g., to receive medical treatment in the United States).
- Individuals traveling to attend educational institutions.
- Individuals traveling to work in the United States (e.g., individuals working in the agriculture industry who must travel between the United States and Canada or Mexico in furtherance of such work).
- Individuals traveling for emergency response and public health purposes (e.g., government officials or emergency responders entering the United States to support federal, state, local, tribal, or territorial government efforts to respond to COVID-19 or other emergencies).
- Individuals engaged in lawful cross-border trade (e.g., truck drivers supporting the movement of cargo between the United States and Canada and Mexico).
- Individuals engaged in official government travel or diplomatic travel.
- Individuals engaged in military-related travel or operations.
- The United States is coordinating closely with Canada and Mexico to protect our citizens while minimizing adverse economic impacts.
Q&A
Q: What will this mean for airline travel and other travel across the border?
A: This action does not apply to air, rail, or sea travel at this time, but does apply to commuter rail and ferry travel.
Source: Travel Restrictions – Fact Sheet – U.S. Embassy & Consulates in Mexico
Note the last point – you can’t drive to/from Mexico, but you can fly to/from Mexico. And Canadians can do the same to/from the U.S. (but Americans cannot due to restrictions imposed by Canada).
Numerous countries blocked travel to and from India months ago, due to the “Delta” variant. As of last week, the Delta variant was documented in over 90 countries – including in Australia, and presently on board a fishing vessel docked in New Zealand.
The travel restrictions did not stop the Delta variant from spreading. It is possible the Delta mutation developed in multiple places, too.
Related: See how Dr. Eric Feigl-Ding lobbied vociferously to keep U.S. schools closed, while he and his family secretly moved to Austria so their son could attend an open, in-person school there. And did this while the border is closed to most Americans (his wife is Austrian so they could cross the border). Border restrictions are for unimportant, non-essential, worthless peons, which is most of us.
Go down through the whole thread to see photos (mostly captures from Microsoft Flight Simulator). Very clever design here from the 1970s. Some investors are trying to bring it back to life today.