Flying Car

In 1989, I was in the cafeteria at Westfield State College and I overheard a couple of kids discussing the movie Back to the Future Part II. One of the lads remarked that he knew that the hover board used by Marty McFly (Michael J. Fox) actually existed. I remember thinking Yeah, right; just like Deloreans can fly and travel through time.

Flying cars have been focal points in some movies and television shows for more than 50 years

• 1961 - The Absent Minded Professor
• 1962 - 1988 - The Jetsons
• 1968 - Chitty Chitty Bang Bang

It’s not just fiction writers who have an affinity for aero vehicles. According to the Los Angeles Times, inventors and industrialist have attempted to devise a flying car.

• 1926 – Henry Ford produced an aircraft he named the "Model T of the Air," the Ford Flivver. The program was cancelled after test pilot Harry Brooks was killed in a Flivver crash.
• 1947 – Designer Henry Dreyfuss attached an aircraft engine onto a four-seat fiberglass car body for Consolidated Vultee Aircraft Corp. The program was cancelled after a fatal crash.
• 1971 – Henry Smolinski and Hal Blake combined a Cessna and a Ford Pinto. Unfortunately, this venture also failed. In 1973, both men were killed when the contraption crashed on takeoff.

It seemed as if a safe flying car was a fantasy. But, even fantasies can come true. By the end of 2012, you could be operating a flying car. Terrafugia, Inc based in Woburn, Massachusetts, developed the Transition® Roadable Aircraft and on their website Terrafugia, Inc states, “First customer delivery of a Transition® Roadable Aircraft is expected to occur in late 2012.”

The craft received Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) certification and on March 1, 2012, the Transition® Roadable Aircraft made its debut at the New York International Auto Show. It made its first successful test flight on March 23, 2012.

If you have a Sport Pilot license, a valid driver's license and a mere $279,000.00 you could own a base model Transition® Roadable Aircraft and be flying or driving to work by the end of 2012.

Do you think you want to plunk down almost 300K for the opportunity to purchase a flying car?