First manned drone uses 54 propellers

History is full of DIY flying machines, including the occasional Joe who ties a bunch of helium balloons to his lawn chair.

So it was only a matter of time before someone would figure out the number of drone propellers it would take to put a man in the air The answer is 54.

A British man may have made the first manned drone flight, if there can be such a category, when he fastened a 54 rotors from quadcopters to make a personal helicopter he dubbed the Swarm.

You will understand the name if you watch the YouTube video. Let’s just say the video is best viewed with the sound off.

There was lift off . . . but not much else. The video is six minutes of him rising a few feet off the ground and then gently landing it. The only other sound on the video – the one time the killer bee sound was overpowered – was when the cameraman seemed to gasp when the unidentified flyer suddenly rose 15 or 20 feet.

According to gasturbine101, who posted the video on Aug. 29, the pilot used six grouped control channels to get the rotors spinning and the Swarm off the ground. There have been more than a half-million views of the historic (?) flight on YouTube.

No word on what comes next from this daring drone hacker.

Source: DigitalTrends

David Pierini

David Pierini is a former newspaper writer and long-time photographer. Considered a luddite by most of his friends, they did not believe him when he broke the news that he would be writing for a technology website. He is fascinated by human nature and would love to cultivate stories about the people driving the tech bus. Reach out to him at [email protected].