CZECH REPUBLIC: As global automakers compete to bring the first flying car to market, Czech pilot Pavel Brezina is trying a different tack: instead of creating a car that flies, he has made a "GyroDrive" -- a mini helicopter you can drive.
The engineer and owner of Nirvana Systems, a company producing motors for small flying machines, insists his vehicle is the first in the world authorised to operate both on roads and in the air.
"This is the only road certified flying vehicle I know about," Brezina told AFP in a hangar at the Prerov-Bochor airport in the eastern Czech Republic.
"Everyone is trying to make a high-speed car that can fly, but this is a different thing," said the tall, bespectacled 51-year-old, who has 30 years' experience as a pilot under his belt.
His GyroDrive vehicle is based on a gyroplane -- a mini-helicopter -- that uses a copter-style rotor to move up and down, and an aeroplane-type "pusher propeller" to go forward.
Brezina's company buys gyroplane kits from a German firm, and then assembles and equips them with a system allowing the pilot-driver to switch between a petrol engine propelling the rotors and an electric engine that drives the wheels.
The two-seat GyroDrive has a maximum driving speed of just 40 kph (25 mph) and can take its crew of two on short drives to a petrol station or a hotel.
It needs less than 100 metres (110 yars) to take off and reaches a top speed of 180 kph in the air. Its flying range is 600 kilometres.