Hyperdrive
Flying Trains Could Be Coming Your Way
- French firm has designed an airplane with removable wings
- It’s presenting plane to Boeing, Asia to cut Europe dependence
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It sounds like something Q, the tech guy in James Bond movies, would create: A plane that lands on a runway, shrugs its wings off, turns into a train and rolls on to rails to drop you off at your local station.
That’s what a French entrepreneur, who’s made millions by connecting engineers with industrial groups, is pitching to Boeing Co. and others. "Link & Fly" is Akka Technologies’s new flagship aircraft design, with wings that come off to hasten turnover at airports and make boarding easier and closer to passengers’ homes.