Electric Eel demonstrates hybrid electric flight

Journeys on regional airline routes could be undertaken with hybrid electric power following the successful test flight of Ampaire’s Electric EEL technology demonstrator. 

Ampaire, a California-based electric aviation company, took its first hybrid electric flights in Scotland on August 12, 2021, crossing the Pentland Firth from Kirkwall Airport on the Orkney Isles to regional airport Wick John O’Groats Airport in the north of mainland Scotland.

The trials, said to be the first to operate on a viable regional airline route, are part of the Sustainable Aviation Test Environment (SATE) project, which is being led by Highlands and Islands Airports Limited.

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Funded by UK Research and Innovation through the Industrial Strategy Challenge Fund, SATE is based at Kirkwall Airport, which is also home to the UK’s first operationally based low-carbon aviation test centre. SATE forms part of the UKRI’s Future Flight Challenge, which has been created to test low-carbon aviation technologies and investigate the airport infrastructure necessary to support sustainable aviation.