“It’s real. It’s happening now”, Hyperloop CEO Rob Lloyd said.
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Today’s test was significant because it provided validation that Hyperloop One’s propulsion technology would be viable once the system is built. Sections of giant empty tubes sit nearby, each 3.3 meters in diameter and branded with the Hyperloop One logo. “We’re aiming to hit 400 miles per hour in two seconds”.
Hyperloop One, a start-up hoping to revolutionize transport systems, held its first public test of engine components being created to rocket pods carrying people or cargo through tubes at speeds of 700 miles per hour (1,125 kilometers) or more.
The Hyperloop proposed by Elon Musk, the creator of Tesla Motors, Pay Pal and Space X. Elon said the Hyperloop might be an alternative to the costly California Rocket Speed Rail.
HTT announced on Monday that it had exclusively licensed passive magnetic levitation technology that would serve to keep Hyperloop pods off the track, minimizing friction as they speed through a tube.
All the technology to make Hyperloop transport a reality already exists, but it’s putting it all together that seems to be the harder and time consuming part.
Gizmodo reported on the test, which took place out in the Nevada desert, and is shown in the above video. Here’s how the company envisions a hyperloop network: A series of tubes will connect metropolitan areas.
“Educating the public, showing them something like Hyperloop works for transporting freight is really important”, said Jeff Joyner, an intellectual property attorney specializing in transportation technology at Century City’s Greenberg Traurig.
In a related US Today report, the Hyperloop One’s first test was evidence of it just being a mere concept: that it can be done. A series of other partnerships including Deutsche Bahn Engineering & Consulting, global engineering and consulting group, Systra, and the British engineering consultancy group Arup, which is now working on London’s Crossrail, have also been made. Hyperloop One provides the technology; the competitors submit a comprehensive case of how that technology should be used in their location.
Hyperloop Technologies Inc. has closed an $80 million Series B funding round and secured development partnerships with several large engineering firms.
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The first public test of Hyperloop One’s acceleration technology was an early step toward building a new kind of high-speed transportation system.
