The invention discloses a waitressing drone that brings drinks to people at the restaurant, and the orders are identified from the Facebook photo of the user, that the drone displays when making the delivery. The invention facilitates the interaction with humans and drones via the social network. With the invention, the order input time is greatly reduced for the consumer, and the consumer may move about while waiting for the order as the drone finds the consumer. Also importantly, the social nature of the drone allows for the sharing of drones among multiple human users. Further, the interfacing of the social human profile with non-human drone profiles allows for the continuous retraining and reprogramming of drones to meet more specific and individualistic user tasks, thereby liberating people from mundane manual labour.

A modular vertical take-off and landing aircraft for transporting persons and/or loads, comprising a flight module with multiple drive units arranged on a supporting framework structure, each drive unit having an electric motor and a propeller operatively connected to the electric motor, a transport module having a conveying pod and a connection device for connecting the conveying pod to the flight module. The connection device has an elongated shaft, one end of which is attached to the conveying pod, and a coupling device for connecting the flight module to another end of the elongate shaft of the transport module.

Disclosed is a transport module (1) for a vertical take-off and landing aircraft for transporting persons and/or loads, having a conveying pod (2) and a connection device (3) for connecting the conveying pod (2) to a flight: module (5). The connection device (3) has an elongate shaft (6), one end of which has a coupling device (4) and the other end of which is attached to the conveying pod (2).

Disclosed is a take-off and landing station (1) for a flying vehicle (2) for transporting people and/or loads, which flying vehicle takes off and lands vertically and comprises a flight module (3), having a plurality of drive units (17) arranged on a supporting framework structure (16) of the flight module (3), and a transportation module (4), which can be coupled to the flight module (3). The take-off and landing station (1) comprises a holding apparatus (21) having a plurality of gripper elements and support elements (11) for supporting, fixing and/or orienting the supporting framework structure (16) during take-off and landing of the flying vehicle (2) or the flight module (3).

A flight module for a vertical take-off and landing aircraft comprises multiple drive units arranged on a supporting framework structure that comprises struts interconnected at node points. Each drive unit comprises an electric motor and a propeller that is operatively connected to the electric motor. Some of the drive units are arranged outside the node points.

Disclosed is a charging station (2) for a vertical take-off and landing aircraft (1) comprising one or more energy stores, the station having a charging device for transferring electrical energy to the energy store or stores. Also disclosed is a combined charging station (12) for vertical take-off and landing aircraft, each aircraft comprising one or more energy stores, the combined charging station (12) having multiple charging stations.

A seat determination system according to an embodiment is a seat determination system for determining seat assignment of each of a plurality of passengers in an aircraft including a plurality of seats for passengers, including: a weight measuring unit for measuring an on-board weight of each of passengers to board the aircraft, the on-board weight being a weight to be carried by the aircraft; a calculation unit for calculating a center-of-gravity position of the aircraft when the on-board weights of the passengers are assigned to respective seat positions in each of a plurality of estimated seat assignments; and a selection unit for selecting a seat assignment with the center-of-gravity position being within a predetermined range from among the estimated seat assignments.

A thrust producing unit with a fail-safe electrical drive unit that drives a rotor of a rotary-wing aircraft. Fail-safe electrical drive unit may include input shafts, fixedly attached belt pulleys that are fixedly attached to the respective input shafts, output shaft that is coupled to rotor, freewheeling belt pulleys that are mounted to output shaft by means of respective freewheels such that output shaft rotates freely when output shaft rotates faster than one of the freewheeling belt pulleys belts that connect fixedly attached belt pulleys with the respective freewheeling belt pulleys, and electric motors that are coupled with the respective input shafts.

A transportation system that includes one or more pods that each includes an interior space configured to house travelers and objects. The pods can be attached to and transported by multiple different vehicles. The different vehicles can provide for different modes of transportation depending upon the plans of the travelers. Different modes include but are not limited to ground travel, air travel, water travel, and rail travel.

An integrated multimode thermal energy transfer system, method and apparatus for full-scale clean fuel electric-powered multirotor aircraft with automatic on-board-capability to provide sensor-based temperature awareness and adjustment to critical components and zones of the aircraft. Automatic computer monitoring, including by a programmed triple-redundant digital autopilot computer, controls each motor-controller and motor to produce pitch, bank, yaw and elevation, while simultaneously measuring, calculating, and adjusting temperature and heat transfer of aircraft components and zones, to protect critical components from exceeding operating parameters and to provide a safe, comfortable environment for occupants during flight. By using the results of the measurements to inform computer monitoring, the methods and systems can use byproducts including thermal energy disparities and differentials related to both fuel supply systems and power generating systems to both add and remove heat from different aircraft zones to improve aircraft function, comfort, and efficiency.