The race to create working, practical personal jetpacks

permo-w wrote: post #4

matthewfelgate wrote: post #3

I really don't get some people's obsession with jetpacks. Is it just because they look cool?

what is it that jetpacks allow you to do?

Jetpack could allow person to kill themselves by going up and crashing down or to some other object?

Re: The race to create working, practical personal jetpacks

#6

Post by bilsbie » Thu, Dec 22, 2022, 12:49 PM UTC

I’m so excited about these. I think the coolest thing would be exploring areas that are hard to hike to.

But I really want a good safety story. Maybe it needs airbags all around to turn you into a giant beach ball if something goes wrong?

Or at least a lot of redundancy.

Re: The race to create working, practical personal jetpacks

#7

Post by dsomers » Thu, Dec 22, 2022, 12:50 PM UTC

matthewfelgate wrote: post #3

I really don't get some people's obsession with jetpacks. Is it just because they look cool?

Come on, I 100% realize that jetpacks will probably always be impractical/unsafe. Although, I think there’s a lot of allure in the same way that there is for motorcycles. I imagine you would get this sense of free flying, like a bird — it just seems fun. And if we somehow magically engineered past the energy and safety problems, you’d have mobility like a helicopter, but without needing the helicopter pad in cities. Like how scooters and motorcycles can be more convenient in cities because they’re easier to park. Dream a little, it’s fun.

Re: The race to create working, practical personal jetpacks

#8

Post by BartjeD » Thu, Dec 22, 2022, 1:14 PM UTC

dsomers wrote: post #7

matthewfelgate wrote: post #3

I really don't get some people's obsession with jetpacks. Is it just because they look cool?

Come on, I 100% realize that jetpacks will probably always be impractical/unsafe. Although, I think there’s a lot of allure in the same way that there is for motorcycles. I imagine you would get this sense of free flying, like a bird — it just seems fun. And if we somehow magically engineered past the energy and safety problems, you’d have mobility like a helicopter, but without needing the helicopter pad in cities.…

Jetpacks are unsafe when users can manipulate them and potentially crash them, or ignore safety warnings etc..

It's a lot safer if they are flown by AI. Possibly only reverting to manual control in an emergency and then only for a controlled AI assisted landing. For example.

That could prevent the scenario where terrorist with TNT strapped to his belt flies into a buildng.

On the other hand: People could still muck with the hardware and the software. Just making it more difficult doesn't rule it out.

Re: The race to create working, practical personal jetpacks

#9

Post by 323 » Thu, Dec 22, 2022, 1:17 PM UTC

bilsbie wrote: post #6

I’m so excited about these. I think the coolest thing would be exploring areas that are hard to hike to. But I really want a good safety story. Maybe it needs airbags all around to turn you into a giant beach ball if something goes wrong? Or at least a lot of redundancy.

I think user error is a much biggest risk than technical failure.

Unless you can make the jetpack prevent you from doing stupid things, like Airbus airplanes which disallow the pilot going outside the safety envelope.

Maybe you can have a safety mode, which doesn't allow you going over 5 m height and 30 km/h speed, or something like that.

Re: The race to create working, practical personal jetpacks

#10

Post by ltbarcly3 » Thu, Dec 22, 2022, 1:21 PM UTC

If there were a perfectly reliable, super easy to use jetpack: you would not be allowed to use it. Even if the technology were there, so are powerlines, helicopters, and other jetpack users.

Besides that, there are billions of dollars of security fences around government and other installations like power plants. I doubt they would let that be basically nullified, and would fight tooth and nail to prevent the sale of these, if they existed .