Tag Archives: aviation

Company unveils airplane design with seats on top of aircraft

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Sit high above it all in a transparent canopy that sits on top of the airplane. (Windspeed Technologies)

We’ve seen some pretty scary airplane seat designs.

From unwieldy bicycle-seat triangles to split level stackers, most design firms are just looking for new ways to cram more and more passengers into the cabin.

But a new design from Washington-based firm Windspeed Technologies is really a breath of fresh air.

Introducing the SkyDeck— a patent-pending seat design that aims to give a few lucky passengers a 360 degree view of the surrounding clouds by sitting them on top of the plane in a fully transparent bubble.

Unlike other seat design models, the SkyDeck is designed to be incorporated into existing types of aircraft and would cost between $8 million to $25 million to install depending on the type of plane.

Experience 360 views in Windspeed’s latest video animation.

“Current in-flight entertainment offerings have not changed much over the decades. We wanted to come up with a product that would provide a higher level of entertainment to reduce the boredom of long flights,” says Windspeed of the new design.

The canopy itself will be comprised of “the same high strength proprietary material as those used on supersonic fighter jets” and will be able to withstand a variety of hits including bird strikes. An aerodynamic “teardrop” shape of the canopy will help reduce the drag factor while anti-condensation film will be applied to stop it fogging up and a UV-protection coating will passengers from burning up inside the transparent vestibule.

Guests can access the SkyDeck via a Jetsons-era looking elevator chute or take stairs from the main level galley.

Though an airline has yes to put in an order for a SkyDeck, the company says it would take just 18 months from order date until the plane is up and running with its seats in the clouds.

 

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Soar through the air in this futuristic ‘invisible’ plane

  • Flying over any city has never been so cool.  Technicon Design Studio France

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    An exterior of the high- tech plane.Technicon Design Studio France

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    Sunny skies all around.Technicon Design Studio France

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    The exterior cameras project images on the screens inside the cabin.Technicon Design Studio France

Who doesn’t a love a great view when soaring at 35,000 feet?

A new private plane design brings world class views to every passenger—without any windows.

Technicon Design’s Paris based team designed the jet to display to 360-degree views that are simulated on internal screens from external cameras that capture the surrounding environment in real time, according to the Daily Mail.

The images displayed in the interior cabin—including the walls and even the ceiling—give passengers the feeling of flying through the air in an invisible vessel.

For business minded clientele, the screens can also be used for video conferences. Or if you’re in the mood for a some entertainment, kick back and relax with a state of the art in flight movie. For claustrophobic passengers, the screens can also be used to project relaxing landscapes like a tropical beach.

Technicon Design created the design for a National Business Aviation Association and has since won an award at the International Yacht & Aviation Awards in the exterior design category.

“I challenged the team to break out of conventional thinking with regards to a business jet exterior and interior,” Gareth Davies, design director at Technicon Design’s studio near Paris, told the Daily Mail.

“We quickly settled on the controversial yet interesting idea of removing the windows from the cabin and using existing or very near future technology to display the exterior environment on flexible screens.”

A transparent plane might be a nightmare for some fearful travelers but if the design takes off, it will definitely one of the coolest ways to travel.

Take a look at the plane in action.

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Successor to the SR-71 Blackbird

The Switch

This is the successor to the SR-71 Blackbird, and it is gorgeous

(Photo by Lockheed Martin)

(Photo by Lockheed Martin)

The SR-71, arguably the country’s most recognizable spy plane after the U-2, was retired in 1998. But like many human retirees of the same generation, what became known as the Blackbird has had a healthy post-retirement career. From appearances in the “X-Men” franchise to cameos in the “Transformers” series, this super-speedy jet has taken off in modern popular culture.

So it’s only natural that the Blackbird’s successor might inspire similar appeal. More than a decade after the last SR-71 was decommissioned, Lockheed Martin has unveiled the gorgeous-looking SR-72. It flies just as far and twice as fast as its predecessor — and, in a twist, it’s now lethal, according to Aviationweek:

The SR-72 is being designed with strike capability in mind. “We would envision a role with over-flight ISR, as well as missiles,” Leland says. Being launched from a Mach 6 platform, the weapons would not require a booster, significantly reducing weight. The higher speed of the SR-72 would also give it the ability to detect and strike more agile targets. “Even with the -SR-71, at Mach 3, there was still time to notify that the plane was coming, but at Mach 6, there is no reaction time to hide a mobile target. It is unavoidable ISR,” he adds.

The jet accelerates by way of a two-part system. A conventional jet turbine helps boost the aircraft up to Mach 3, at which point a specialized ramjet takes over and pushes the plane even faster into hypersonic mode.

From Lockheed’s mock-ups, there doesn’t appear to be a bubble for the pilot — which suggests a windowless cockpit or fantasies about a future unmanned version of the plane. But let’s not get ahead of ourselves.

Brian Fung
Brian Fung covers technology for The Washington Post, focusing on electronic privacy, national security, digital politics and the Internet that binds it all together. He was previously the technology correspondent for National Journal and an associate editor at the Atlantic. His writing has also appeared in Foreign Policy, Talking Points Memo, the American Prospect and Nonprofit Quarterly.

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