The American Helicopter Society issued a a prize of $10,000 for the Igor I Sikorsky Human Powered Helicopter Competition in 1980. By May 2009 the prize was $250,000. The requirement was to lift off to a height of 3m/9.8ft and hover over a 10sq.m/107.6 sq.ft ‘box’ for one minute using only human power. More than 20 teams tried and failed.
The AeroVelo team 9the name derived from ‘aerodynamic’ and Velo, French for bicycle) was led by pilot and chief engineer Dr. Todd Reichert and co-chief engineer Cameron Robertson, and made up of students at the University of Toronto.
The Atlas four rotors each span nearly 21.3m/70 ft. The airframe is of very light carbonfibre tubes and polymer weighing only 52kg/115lb, with a highly modified bicycle frame pedalled by the pilot.
The Atlas received many incremental improvements during 18 months and on 13 June 2013 Altas flew for 64.11 seconds, reached a peak altitude of 3.3m/10.8ft, and drifted off-centre a maximum of 9.8m/32.2ft.
The American Helicopter Society declared the Toronto, Canada-based AeroVelo Atlas team the winners.
All Aero 