Vertical Aerospace’s Air Taxi Prototype Appears to Have Crashed Written 10 August 2023
Vertical Aerospace's VX4 prototype in July, when it announced that the demonstrator had flown untethered for the first time the previous month. | Credit: Vertical Aerospace; Aerospace America–©
Aerospace America reports that a remotely piloted air taxi prototype “appears to have crashed during testing at the company’s Flight Test Centre at Cotswold Airport, based on photos posted online by local journalists.” Vertical Aerospace confirmed that its VX4 all-electric “experimental prototype” was involved in an “incident” at the test center, and said “there were no injuries.” The statement “was made in a note filed today to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).” Vertical is “required to reveal ‘results of operations’ and other significant developments to SEC because its shares are traded on the New York Stock Exchange.” The company told the SEC, “Our flight test programme is designed to establish the limits of the aircraft’s performance, and the incident occurred during an uncrewed test of the aircraft’s maneuverability during a motor failure test scenario, which is a key requirement to progress to crewed operations.”
Full Story (Aerospace America)