Egregoros

Some of the required energy is already in the air, that's why parasailing works, even gliders loaded with military equipment flew.

Landing will be more of the challenge, as "fluctuating" power equals certain crash. Staying in the air is not the gating problem.

Well, if you allow that the technology can be significantly changed, then it's self-evident that it can be accomplished with a blimp...

Parasailing works because it has a connection to the ground (water), a plane needs to be in air-only so the challenges are more acute.

If I recall it correctly "flight" was once recorded as something capable to stay in the air a minute longer than the previous record holder. Even if the pilot got killed during take-off (sometimes) or landing (more often) it was still recorded as a success. So a human cannonball is a flight, and so is a parachuter that lands miles from the LZ.

So yes, a blimp is a great aerial vehicle but do not fly over Chicago with it because the hoodrats will shooting it full of holes.

Judging by the thumbnail art, the video is slop, so it shouldn't come as much of a surprise that it is also bait 🤷‍♀️

@cjd

Nuclear would work to power an electric plane if you could build a small enough reactor.

Use the heat from the reactor to drive a high RPM sterling engine that charges a small battery bank that can power the plane for maybe an hour, and just keep topping it up, and bingo hybrid electric plane.

Unfortunately flying nuclear reactors won't likely get FAA clearance anytime soon 😂

The molten salt reactor (MSRE) has it's origin in the airforce wanting a nuclear plane.

The real problem is the shielding so that it doesn't kill the people on board.

@cjd

A micro helium reactor might do the trick. And it might be possible to use tiny amounts of graphite encased uranium, just enough to power the plane for a few flights. The reactor could be shielded using specialized plastics, and boron. Then there is never enough nuclear fuel in the plane to cause a major nuclear accident. Just drop a few pellets into the reactor and off you go!

IMO more likely that batteries will just continue getting better until they have "enough" power density that when you factor in thermal efficiency of turbines, they are okay enough that the fuel cost difference is worth the payload cost.

@cjd

Perhaps, but I'm skeptical the technology is even possible, at least to that extreme.

We're gonna find out, a lot of people said that photolithography would hit a wall at about 10nm, and that has really just not happened.