We first heard of Alauda’s plans for a flying electric racing vehicle series in late 2017, when the Australian startup’s Matt Pearson launched a Kickstarter to gauge interest and raise funds. The team announced its international public debut in mid-2019, and has now unveiled a full-sized, fully functioning electric flying racing car – the Airspeeder Mk3.
The Mk3 is going be raced this year and Alauda Aeronautics is currently building a number of identical racing vehicles at its technical headquarters in Adelaide, South Australia, that will be supplied to teams for the first races around electronically governed courses later this year. But they won’t be manned.
They are intended to serve as a flying test bed that will gather data on vehicle dynamics, performance, safety and powertrain technology to inform the design and specs of the upcoming manned Mk4 racers, so pilots will control the unmanned flyers remotely. But the company is promising spectators plenty of thrills and excitement from the 2021 Airspeeder Mk3 racing series.
