Skyportz’s air taxi vertipad design has received the Blue Sky Innovation Award at the Avalon International Airshow in Australia.
Judges said the company was chosen because it had noted a problem with downwash velocities, anticipated that it could affect the social license of air taxi operators by endangering their passengers, then devised a solution.
The US Federal Aviation Administration’s Engineering Brief 105A (January 2025) introduced new guidelines calling for larger downwash/outwash caution areas, which could restrict where vertiports can be built.
The Skyportz modular vertipad design has been independently tested by Swinburne University of Technology and early results show it can reduce wind velocity by up to 250 percent. “That means less risk, less space required, and more opportunities for property owners to enter the next generation of aviation infrastructure,” Skyportz said.
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