Jeremy Shere

The iconic vision of the technological, space-age future used to be the personal jet pack–a strap-on device that would allow people to zip around the clouds, presumably wherever and whenever they liked.

The jet pack never quite happened, but the dream still has legs. And soon it might come equipped with rotor blades, too. A company in Mexico, Technologia Aeroespecial Mexicana, is working on a “strap-on helicopter” device.

From the picture above you can see that the personal ‘copter has two overhead blades but no tail rotor. Instead, there are tiny rockets at the tips of each blades. Two hydrogen-filled cannisters fuel the blades and you steer with a simple vane in front.

The strap-on ‘copter doesn’t exsit. Yet. At this point it’s still in the “cool-looking computer animation stage.” But according to the company’s website, they have a history of successfully developing lightweight, jet-powered helicopters. Supposedly, so the website claims, they designed a prototype lightweight helicopter for the government of Dubai in the late 1990s.

Anyhow, on the company’s website you can see some pretty cool picture of various ‘copter designed and apparently you can download computer animated version of the strap-on helicopter in action. (Although when I tried to open the animations all I got was a pop-up box filled with computer gibberish.)

Assuming for the moment that the strap-on ‘copter would actually work, I wonder what would happen. You’d need a special license to fly, probably. And I wonder if you’d need to take off from an airport … which would spoil all the fun. What’s cool about the idea of a personal flying device, I think, is that you could wake up in the morning, have your breakfast and coffee, then strap on your jet ‘copter in your driveway and zip off the work. Of course, you’d have to watch out for all the other jet ‘copter commuters up there. How would this work?

Bottom line, I find it heartening that there are still inventors out there trying to make this dream a reality. Whether or not it ever actually happens is sort of irrelevant.

Plus, it remind me of Lawnchair Larry–a guy who in the mid ’80s strapped several weather balloons to a lawnchair and found himself floating 16,000 feet over LAX airport. It’s all part of the same dream of personal flight. Says something interesting, and complimentary, about us as a species.