Icon A5 personal airplane featured on Associated Press

Here's a new type of personal aircraft that seems to have a lot of promise.



(that's 500 km at 220 kph)

Some things that make it interesting is being able to fold the wings up to place it in one's garage, the interior resembling that of a car, and the location of the propeller behind the cockpit instead of in front. Icon's site gives the estimated price at $139,000 but some articles are estimating that the price will end up being a quarter of a million dollars (not sure where the estimate comes from). That price takes it out of the exclusive domain of the ultra rich and places it in that of the normal rich, those that can afford to spend up to a few hundred thousand dollars on something they really want if necessary - and there is a high probability of living next to a lake for them as well.

In the city where I'm from for example (Calgary), the most expensive area is located around the Glenmore Reservoir and from there it's only 50 km northwest to Ghost Lake, a fairly popular place during the summer. That would be less than 30 minutes using the Icon A5.


View Glenmore Reservoir to Ghost Lake in a larger map