He dedicated his entire life on developing a way to get as closer as possible to flying like an actual bird. In 2006, Yves Rossy became the first man in the history of aviation to fly with a jet-propelled wing. Now, he has partnered up with Dubai’s investors in his constant struggle to keep pushing the boundaries within the realm of anti-gravity experiences.
In case you thought carbon fiber is a material only used in the manufacturing of Formula One cars or on Deadmau5' McLaren P1, here we are disappointing you. Yes, its high stiffness, big tensile strength, low weight, increased chemical resistance, high temperature tolerance and so on, together make carbon fiber extremely efficient in the use of advanced car making technologies. But let us not forget where it all started from, which is aerospace application.
Why are we talking about carbon fiber? Because that is exactly what the Swiss pilot and aviation enthusiast Yves Rossy has used to invent, create and fly the world’s first individual jet pack with wings. The world has spoken about this brilliant adventurer before, but it would seem he got to that point where wealthy investors in Dubai became interested in his project.
But let’s push the brakes for a second here and take a closer look at the aircraft first.
A culmination of decades of fulfilling a childhood dream through technological innovation, determination, teamwork and courage, Jetman’s craft is basically a wing-suit system. It comprises a backpack equipped with semi-rigid airplane-type carbon-fiber wings with a span of about 2.4 meters (7.9 feet).
It’s powered by four Jet-Cap P200 jet engines modified from large kerosene-fueled model aircraft engines. We’re talking about a 55-kilogram suit that is capable of propelling the person wearing it to up to 200 km/h (124 mph) in the air, of course.
He has been on Top Gear
In case Rossy’s face is familiar to you, it’s probably because he also appeared on BBC’s Top Gear show, last year, when he raced Richard Hammond and Tony Gerdemeister.
As we were previously saying, Rossi and his futuristic suit have recently partnered up with Dubai to keep developing newer models of the aircraft. The ex-Swiss Air Force pilot first took to the UAE skies to celebrate the country’s 43rd National Day, with himself and the Crown Prince of Dubai Sheikh Hamdan announcing the new project on Instagram.
We stumbled upon some 4K footage with Jetman over Dubai’s sky, in case you want to see what this “flying like a bird” is all about.
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