z Europe // le bourget paris air show z Photo: Air lab in the Concorde Hall at the Le Bourget Paris Air Show All photos: Philippe Domogala
LE BOURGET PARIS AIR SHOW 2019 z by Philippe Domogala, SENIOR CORRESPONDENT, IFATCA Last June, the traditional biannual Paris Air Show took place in Le Bourget. The air show is located near the Le Bourget Air and Space Museum. In front of it, there is a large hangar that contains two Concordes: the first prototype that flew in March 1969 and the last Air France one that flew on the 14th of June 2003, after the last commercial flight, from CDG airport to LFPB airport (2 nautical miles apart). This last flight was the shortest flight ever done by a Concorde, and probably the slowest.
take-off and landing (eVTOL) flight. The Vahana vehicle is self-piloted, or autonomous, and it has onboard detect-and-avoid system that can identify both air and ground hazards. I was interested in that part, but, unfortunately, this vehicle is still a prototype, under development, and not yet fully operational.
Under its wings, was held a very innovative kiosk created for young people looking to choose a job in aviation. On the day I visited, the challenge was urban air mobility and working with autonomous aircraft. The animation was done by Airbus’s head of Urban mobility, Eduardo Puerta, who is in charge of the Vahana project within Airbus. Puerta described the Vahana is an all-electric, single-seat, tilt-wing vehicle demonstrator that focuses on advancing self-piloted, electric vertical
What was interesting in his presentation was his vision for the future, where demographics show that by 2040, 60% of the Earth’s population will live in cities, and our current cities are not designed and prepared for the kind of mass trans- z Photo: AirBus Vahana Air Lab at Le Bourget Paris Air Show
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portation that will be necessary. Many cities by 2040 will exceed tens of millions of people. He said that petrol driven personal cars will disappear soon as the streets will no longer be able to hold the traffic. It will be constant traffic jams. The solutions he presented are either underground or by
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