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‘Seaglider’ Concept Takes On Over-Water Travel Challenge, With a Twist Regent, a New England-based company formed a few years ago by a pair of MIT graduates and aeronautical-industry refugees, is challenging conventions involving airplanes and high-speed boats. Can a winged vehicle capable of leaving the surface of the water still be classed as a watercraft and not an airplane? Regent’s electric-powered seaglider uses a gull-shaped high wing to lift the hull completely off the surface, but never higher than its wingspan. Using that cushion of air well known to pilots, the craft can attain speeds up to 160 knots and has a range of up to 160 statute miles—expected to expand to as far as 500 miles with improvements in battery technology. The current business plan calls for short-range, dock-to-dock service between cities a few hundred miles apart, such as Boston and New York, or Los Angeles and San Francisco. The company projects other possible maritime markets, including the Caribbean, Hawaii and the English Channel. Source: AVWeb.com |
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Extracted from the Newsletter #18 of the Quebec Aerospace Museum. Editors' Note: The MAQ-Express magazine is currently only available in French. Wearing both the Royal Canadian Air Force livery and Kuwaiti registration 9K-APC, the Airbus A330-243 MSN 1653 was photographed on June 1, 2023 at Basel-Mulhouse Freiburg airport (BSL). Photo by Eric Bannwarth. |
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It was returning from the Chateauroux-Déols paint shop in France. Note the number '002' on the nose, foreshadowing the military code "330002" assigned to this aircraft. Delivered to Kuwait Airways in August 2015, it was withdrawn from service on February 6, 2023. It is one of two second-hand aircraft acquired for VIP transport. The second A330 VIP, the future '330001', is still in service in the Kuwait Airways livery in Basel with 9K-APD registration (MSN 1678). These two A330's should theoretically be followed by four more, this time in MRTT version. On February 9, 2023, Eric Bannwarth had the opportunity to photograph the same Airbus on its arrival at Basel-Mulhouse airport still in full Kuwait Airways livery. |
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Editor's Note by Ken Pickford Trivia about Basel-Mulhouse Freiburg airport (BSL) - The airport is physically in France. When you arrive there you have the choice of entering either France or Switzerland. There's a fenced 'customs road' considered Swiss territory leading the few kilometres to the Swiss border and Basel. It also uses the code MLH for the nearby French city of Mulhouse, which it serves. It's also close to the German border. Geneva (GVA) airport, which is immediately adjacent to the French border, also has a 'customs road' to the town of Ferney in France. When they lengthened the single GVA runway 30 or 40 years ago (longest in Switzerland at 12,795 feet) they had to make a trade for some unpopulated territory somewhere else along the border to avoid the runway extension being in France. |
