Greetings from our office where I’m currently mopping up the spilled coffee after just reading Virgin Atlantic’s most recent press release with utter shock and excitement. We receive lots of news about “enhancements”, where airlines take benefits away and pretend they are good, but rarely, ok, never, have we received a release about a plane with state of the art wings, which flap like a bird! Is it a bird? Or is it a plane? You be the judge…
The Dreambird 1417 is the result of a top secret project entirely funded by Richard Branson and meticulously developed by the Virgin Atlantic design team. Using wings made of Graphene, an extremely strong yet flexible material, the wings will literally flap like a bird, “propelling” the plane forward, while creating energy for electronics on board. From Branson…
“Birds are the ultimate flying machine and it’s been a lifelong ambition of mine to harness their energy and apply it to a passenger aircraft. Engineers all over the world have been trying for years to mimic a bird in flight and thanks to the perseverance and dedication of the team at Virgin Atlantic, we’ve finally succeeded. Not only have we harnessed this but we’ve also created a faster, cleaner more self-sustaining aircraft.”
Ok, it sounds great, but will it fly? The answer is, yes, Virgin Atlantic has a tenative launch date of 2019 for the Dreambird 1417 and it will debut on the Seattle to London route, sharing the sky for the first time with flying pigs. Of course if you believe that this is anything more than an APRIL FOOLS JOKE, you will be very sad in about three, two, one. Yep, that’s it. Good one Virgin…
