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by ska 2382 days ago
Some perhaps useful context: Harbour air operates the worlds largest sea plane service, the majority of it between Vancouver (city) and Vancouver Island (mostly Victoria). They are a perfect test bed for this, as the in air time is about 15-20 min for most routes. (less 100km/60m ).

So while electric is a long way from long haul domestic routes, let alone international, I could see it taking over specific services like this fairly quickly, at least relatively speaking. I can see why they are experimenting with it.

Apparently they plan to have certification for this aircraft in the next 2 years, but early days yet.

3 comments

I wouldn't count out international so quickly. Once they've got Victoria sorted, it would be great to see them extend down to Everett, Washington to link up Seattle. It's 68 miles from Vancouver to Victoria, 98 Miles Vancouver to Everett. Theoretically, they could fly out of White Rock to reduce that distance as well.
Yes I didn’t mean to exclude short haul international.
I'm waiting to see if Eviations Alice actually fly's and meets spec's. They're claiming 600 miles of range at around $200/hr. If they can hit that then they are not only competitive in existing markets. But new ones.
Logan Air are also planning on "the the world's first electric–powered commercial passenger flights" in 2021[0] using a converted Britten-Norman Islander. It is similarly for an island hopping service, with the shortest flight just 1.7 miles (typically around 1 minute) which it sounds like this converted DHC-2 de Havilland Beaver should be able to manage.

[0] https://www.pressandjournal.co.uk/fp/news/islands/1893676/el...