many, many small staffed airports
in remote locations all around
rural and regional and remote
locations. It was considered
cheaper to support one short, well
serviced runway in a small country
town than it was to provide money
for a whole complex road network
across miles and miles of desert.
These runways were serviced 24
hours a day. The officer in charge
would be there to give visiting
aviators whatever they needed.
It was a way of keeping the
country going.
It all ended, for political reasons,
around the mid-1970s. And so,
since then, GA pilots in Australia
have had to fend for themselves
at unfamiliar airports. Many
informal arrangements can be
made as a pilot becomes known
within the GA community, but the
dilemma of how to get from the
airport to one’s bed for the night
is always tricky. Notwithstanding,
the fact that mobile phones have
made dialing a taxi, or access to
ride-share services like Uber, a
whole lot easier. This only works
in urban areas. It is a forlorn hope
in remote regions, even if your
phone is working.
And this is the genius of
Richard Glassock ’s f lying
motorbike. Rather than sit around
waiting for a ride, or for the good
old days of Australian aviation
to return, which we all know will
never happen, you’re off. You’re
self-sufficient. Land. Unclip. And
go. You get to take the freedom of
the air with you on land.Why not now?
For most of Richard’s rival’s,
however, the traffic jam is the
motivation for developing a f lying
motorbike. The idea of rising
above the throng is an idea as old
as the motor vehicle itself, and it’s
a thought that has gained a huge
boost in this rocket age. So much
so, that popular imagination,
feeding off popular culture has
left us all wondering where our
jet-packs are, and why we are not
already able to buzz about the sky
at will in a Star Wars Speeder
Bike. If Harry Potter can ...
Of course, this is a problem
for Richard ’s idea, because
his process is conceptually in
reverse. Most people drive and
wish they could f ly. Richard’s
f lies and, when he lands, wishes
that he could drive. Richard’s
rivals who are already designing
f lying motorbikes to fit the
more conventional need, are,
therefore, stealing the media
attention and naturally the
funding as well. The Russian
bank Vnesheconombank
(VEB) recently agreed to back
an ambitious project, from a
Russian firm called Hoversurf,
with some very substantialaustralianflying.com.au 67
July – August 2018 AUSTRALIAN FLYINGfunding. As a consequence,
the Dubai police force recently
signed a memorandum of
understanding with Hoversurf
for the supply of low-f lying hover
bikes for use in police work
around the city.
There is little comparison
though, with Richard’s design.
The Hoversurf is essentially a
drone with one rider, who is at
huge risk of being sliced and diced
by one, or all, of the four propeller
blades as they f ly. It is an ugly
beast. The Glassock concept is
far more elegant and safe, because
it has grown out of the rigorous
mindset of aviation construction
and regulation. Within that
though, Richard’s project is radical
and playful – not least because it
simultaneously provides power
back-up while the plane is in f light.
Of course, Richard, and his
team, have many other innovative
projects on the boil. I don’t
know which of these strange
experiments will be successful
first, but I do know the world is
changing and that the problem of
finding renewable energy sources
for aviation is one that can be
solved. The next generation can
do it, but it is not just the aircraft
itself that has to evolve. We’ve
got a whole range of airspace
management problems, and
for the new breed of aircraft to
land safely on our runways, weneed better public and political
comprehension of what is actually
on the horizon, in order to
conjure an environment that is
sympathetic to f lying.And in the end
After spending time in Richard’s
Institute for Aerospace
Technology, you can sense the
world-wide build up; a revolution
in aircraft design is happening and
it is being led by electrification.
The big players like Airbus and
Boeing are taking it seriously
and many, many research
organisations around the world,
along with progressive companies
like Uber and Google are entering
the space. When Google becomes
an aircraft company, well then,
you know the race is on.MARLOWE PHOTOGRAPHIC