Lifeboat Foundation

FedEx is keen on Cessna’s newest small plane, the SkyCourier, which can carry freight or passengers.

Battery technology improvements are expected to soon enable electric flight and companies in the field are preparing their powertrain technology to support it. In a major move toward that goal, Airbus, Rolls-Royce and Siemens have announced a new partnership to gradually convert a plane to electric propulsion. The project they are collaborating on is the ‘E-Fan X’, a BAe 146 plane on which they are testing their electric motor technology. During ground tests, they already replaced one of the four gas turbines by a two-megawatt electric motor. Paul Eremenko, Airbus’s CTO, commented on the pr…

This one and one in iceland! wow!

Volcanic eruptions on the Indonesian resort island of Bali have prompted officials to cancel flights and move about 24,000 residents out of the way as a thick ash cloud from Mount Agung, thousands of meters high, drifts east and southeast along the archipelago.

Residents were evacuated from 224 points around the island while Lombok International Airport on Pulau Lombok, the island due east of Bali, has closed temporarily, said Ari Ahsan, spokesman for Ngurah Rai International Airport in Bali.

Continue reading “Bali volcano shuts down flights, sends residents scurrying to safety” »

Government of England pledges to roll out Level 5 Self Driving cars by 2021. And, they estimate 1 million people being left unemployed. Gives an idea of what will happen with automation of the Transportation Industry in the US.

UK chancellor says driverless vehicles will revolutionise people’s lives but says for some it will be ‘very challenging’.

Planning to try and automate the entire store.

Walmart (WMT) has been quietly testing out autonomous floor scrubbers during the overnight shifts in five store locations near the company’s headquarters in Bentonville, Arkansas.

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Continue reading “Walmart is ‘secretly’ testing self-driving floor scrubbers, signaling that more robots are coming” »

“Musk seems to be talking about something different, a sports car that could “hop” over obstacles. The emphasis would, presumably, still be on performance and practicality with four wheels on the ground.”

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Some people think autonomous vehicles must be nearly flawless before humans take their hands off the wheel. But RAND research shows that putting AVs on the road before they’re perfect improves the technology more quickly—and could save hundreds of thousands of lives over time.

Putting autonomous vehicles on the road when they perform just better than human drivers could save hundreds of thousands of lives over time. This article explains: r.rand.org/5y4v

Would love to see inside one of these trucks.

Elon Musk unveiled the Roadster’s return toward the end of an event that was supposed to be all about Tesla’s new Semi trucks.