Rolls Royce announced their Spirit of Innovation technology demonstrator slipped the surly bonds for the first time earlier this week. The flight took place in England at the famed MOD Boscombe Down airfield. Almost no other information on the flight was released other than it lasted about 15 minutes—which is near the plane’s endurance—and from the photos it appears it was a sensible gear-down, first hop shakedown flight.
Steady readers will recall our feature on this interesting aircraft, a Nemesis NXT modified by Rolls Royce in search of the world’s electrically powered air speed record. That story can be seen here.
Without further information we can only hope the flight went well and we’ll soon be treated to the full capabilities of what is a unique, technologically forward-looking machine.
