NASA “Puffin” Personal Aircraft Design unveiled

Assam News · January 22, 2010

US space agency NASA is working on a flying suit or jet pack that can fly at 240 kilometers per hour speed carrying a person. The conceptual project has been named "Puffin" and NASA officially unveil the design on January 20, 2010 at an American Helicopter Society meeting in San Francisco. Take a look at the picture or watch the video below.

NASA Puffin

The Puffin is 3.7-meter in length and is designed to stand on it’s tail. The total wingspan is 4.1-meter. Excluding 45 kilograms of rechargeable lithium phosphate batteries, this flying jet pack weighs just 135 kilograms. The Puffin will be powered by a 60 horsepower electric motor.

In principle, the Puffin can cruise at 240 kilometers per hour and may increase it’s speed up to 480 kph. And the best this is that it can go up to about 9,150 meters above surface. With current batteries, the Puffin is expected to run 80 km while cruising at 240 kph. But NASA engineers are hopeful to see a range of 240 to 320 kilometers by year 2017.