At this point, as with development and research in other technological areas, companies should not only worry about the development of new models capable of detecting obstacles, following us wherever we go or other series of characteristics that, more than functionally interesting for the end user are, to say the least, eye-catching. Since Vanilla aricraft, a company based in Falls Church (Virginia), show us their innovative VA001, a drone that has just broken the flight autonomy record.
Before continuing, tell you that the VA001 is not a drone as such, that is, a commercial drone equipped with electric motors and batteries, but rather it is an unmanned aerial vehicle with a combustion engine. With this in mind, let you know that the drone, loaded with just over 9 kilograms as a simulated payload, was able to maintain an altitude of between 6.500 and 7.500 feet for no less than 52 hours.
The VA001 breaks the record for flight autonomy for a drone.
As a detail, tell you that this flight in which it was possible to beat the previous flight autonomy record was planned to last about 120 hours although, due to the forecast of ice in the area and the restrictions the company had to lower the drone. Once on land, those responsible could see how the same still I had fuel to fly for another 90 hours, about six more days of flight.
One point to take into account, at least that is how it has been revealed in the press release published in this regard, apparently the take-off and landing of the aircraft had to be carried out by a controller while, when it has already reached its height, it can be completely autonomous. As a final note, it should be noted that, to this day, its engineers continue to work on the development of this drone trying to develop a model capable of carrying a payload of about 13 kilograms during 10 days flying at an average altitude of about 15.000 feet.