Following its experience during the Qatar 2022 World Cup, the company NetxNorth has set up in the Balearic Islands to offer an air taxi service with electric aircraft, which resemble manned drones, have a capacity for five passengers, take off and land vertically, and will offer customers internal flights in Mallorca, Menorca, Ibiza and Formentera, as well as inter-island travel, providing an alternative to certain air and road routes. The price of the most economical route will be 90 euros per passenger for an internal journey, according to Gonzalo Grandes, spokesman for the NetxNorth company.
However, in order to implement this type of flights in electric aircraft operating outside of conventional airports and aerodromes, NetxNorth requires a mandatory authorization from the European Union Aviation Safety Agency (EASA)which the company expects to achieve in 2024, admits Gonzalo Grandes to this newspaper.
NetxNorth intends to become, also in the Balearic Islands, one of the most important leading companies in the new last mile aviation and offer their customers a new form of air mobility which will allow the public to save up to 80% of travel time by booking flights both intraisland as interislaoffering better accessibility to aviation and preparing for the adoption of the innovative aircraft known as eVTOL (Electric Vertical Take Off and Landing).
Alternative also to road travel
Underlines the company that “this is a more sustainable transportation alternative to traditional forms of mobility because, through the use of clean energy to power the eVTOL batteries, they manage to completely eliminate the negative impact on both the atmosphere and the environment…”“.
These air cabs, will take off, in the event of getting the eASA’s mandatory authorizationsince vertipuertos, landing and take-off spaces for drones to deliver goods and transport people to other parts of the city or the island. “It will also be possible, as in the vehicles of Uber o Cabifythe company’s fleet of vehicles can be rented or shared with other users,” adds Gonzalo Grandes.
However, for the time being, NetxNorth, and waiting for their plans to materialize, operates only with one air cab company, conventional, with helicopters that operate their routes from the son Bone aerodromet, the executive terminal of the ibiza airport and the sant Lluís aerodrome, in Menorca.
The objective during this time, the company points out, is to detect the best routes and locations in order to later be able to operate with the aforementioned electric aircraft and silent aircrafts that will offer a mobility alternative to some of the land and sea routes, also reaching places where other means of transportation cannot reach.
For the full article, please visit Diario de Ibiza website here.