BBC News has a video as well of a similar vehicle by Hybrid Air Vehicles Ltd. HAV-3 prototype first flight at Caddington shown.
SkyCats can:
* Land and take off on any reasonably flat surface: water, snow, sand and tundra.
* Land and take off vertically.
* Burn less fuel than existing aircraft, often less than 25%.
* Deliver freight to destinations inaccessible to other modes of transport.
* Provide unique surveillance and interdiction solutions.
We are launching a new family of environmentally friendly Hybrid Air Vehicles (HAV) known as SkyCat, with payloads spanning 20 to 1000 tons, operating at heights up to 10,000ft at speeds between 90 and 120 knots, with endurance up to 5 days. The SkyCat's ability to operate autonomously onto any surface including water, snow, marsh and unprepared ground allied to little or no requirement for ground infrastructure or ground crew, makes it a 'market changing' transformational concept.
All variants of SkyCat consume as much as 70% less fuel per tonne kilometer than conventional aircraft.
The P-791 appears to be essentially identical in design to the SkyCat design unsuccessfully promoted by the now defunct British company Advanced Technologies Group (ATG). SkyCat technologies are once again being developed and promoted in the US by the Hybrid Aircraft Corporation (HAC) located in New Mexico. Press reports have also confirmed that the P-791 incorporates some of the most distinctive design features of the SkyCat, specifically the use of hover/suction skirts as "landing gear." Industry observers have noted that engineering individuals closely associated with HAC later worked on the WALRUS project and P-791 at Lockheed-Martin.
Northrop Grumman has a $517 million order for hybrid airships Northrop partnered with Hybrid Air Vehicles on the contract.
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