Flying taxis braced for takeoff at Dubai Airshow

Flying taxis close to reality in US, UAE, India. Archer Aviation's eVTOL aircraft, Midnight, expected to get FAA approval in 2025. UAE flights to start in 2026. India to launch flights in New Delhi, Mumbai, Bangalore. Midnight has 12 propellers, can recharge in 6-7 mins, max range 160km. Flights booked as ride shares, cost $4-5/passenger mile, dropping to half in 2-3 yrs. Eco-friendly, 100x less noise than helicopters.

Flying taxis have been a sci-fi fixture for decades, but one operator says they are finally close to reality, first in the United States and then the United Arab Emirates and India.

“What we used to think of as science fiction is now science fact,” Billy Nolen, Archer Aviation’s chief safety officer, told AFP at the Dubai Airshow on Wednesday.

“This is happening, it is real, and you will see this in the market in 2025.”

Reports of futuristic aircraft ferrying passengers over cities — and their car-choked roads — have been cropping up for years, evoking images of 1960s cartoon The Jetsons.

Yet regulatory approval from the US Federal Aviation Administration for Archer’s Midnight, a four-passenger, electric-powered vertical take-off and landing (eVTOL) aircraft, is expected as soon as 2025.

That will trigger “almost concurrent” certification in the UAE, said Nikhil Goel, chief commercial officer at Archer, whose major backers include Mubadala, an Emirati sovereign wealth fund.

UAE flights are expected to start in 2026 on two initial routes: from Dubai airport to the upmarket Palm development, and Abu Dhabi airport to the city-centre Corniche.