flying taxi owned by UK-born billionaire and Ovo Energy chief Stephen Fitzpatrick has crashed throughout a take a look at run in the Cotswolds, in accordance with stories.
Mr Fitzpatrick’s US-listed flying taxi agency Vertical Aerospace confirmed {that a} prototype model of the product crashed whereas testing the “aircraft’s manoeuvrability” on Wednesday.
The Bristol-based startup is constructing a five-seater flying taxi that may attain speeds of as much as 200mph.
Nobody was injured in the course of the incident because the crashed plane was being remotely piloted, The Daily Telegraph reported.
Vertical Aerospace was based by Mr Fitzpatrick, 45, the inexperienced power billionaire, in 2016 to construct small, battery-powered, vertical takeoff plane.
It went public in New York 16 months in the past by way of a “blank-cheque” merger that valued it at $2.2 billion, shortly earlier than the market soured. It is valued now at about $330 million.
Auditors raised considerations over Vertical Aerospace’s funds earlier this 12 months. They warned that there was a “material uncertainty” it may proceed and stated it needed to increase further funds to safe its long-term future.
Mr Fitzpatrick, a serial entrepreneur who as soon as owned a Formula 1 group, based Ovo in 2009. He purchased Kensington Roof Gardens, as soon as owned by Richard Branson, in 2020 and is lavishing tens of millions of kilos on a luxurious makeover.
Vertical Aerospace has been contacted for remark.