EXA Flying Racecar Conducts Successful Maiden Flights

Automotive racing is one of the most popular sports worldwide, with many different racing series and events for fans to enjoy. A new form of motorsport is in the works that was first announced in the summer of 2019 by Matthew Pearson. Pearson wanted to create the world's first racing series for flying electric cars.

While Pearson calls them flying electric cars, they're actually quadrotor aircraft with no wheels. The prototype electric racing vehicle is called EXA, and it was recently revealed for the first time and successfully completed its first flights. Airspeeder EXA is the car's name, and the company says races will be brought to the public from technical minds at Brabham, McLaren, Jaguar, F1, Boeing, and Rolls-Royce.

The company says three remotely piloted global races will take place in 2021. The vehicles use a "virtual forcefield" created using LiDAR and radar to allow close but safe racing action. EXA test flights were conducted at undisclosed test locations in the desert of South Australia and were supervised by the Australian Civil Aviation Safety Authority.

With the successful test flights out of the way, the door was open for electric flying car racing to begin in 2021. Three international locations for the races will be revealed soon. The racing vehicles aren't designed to carry a pilot inside. Pilots from aviation, motorsport, and eSports backgrounds will remotely pilot the vehicles in the world's only racing electric vertical take-off and landing aircraft.

Races will be conducted using electronically governed, augmented reality enabled sky-tracks. Audiences will be able to watch the races via digital streams showing the full dynamic potential of the aircraft. The racing vehicles themselves reportedly have a higher thrust-to-weight ratio than F-15 jet. The company behind the racing series says it will help hasten the arrival of eVTOL aircraft, a business segment predicted to be worth $1.5 trillion by 2040.