Passenger aircraft without pilot make debut in 2 cities

EHang Holdings, a Chinese urban air mobility technology company, completed commercial flight demonstrations of its pilotless passenger-carrying aerial vehicles on Dec 28, 2023.

Demonstrations were conducted on the same day in Guangzhou, Guangdong province, and Hefei, Anhui province.

Officials and residents in both cities joined the first group of invited passengers to take a ride on aircraft model EH216-S, which had been recently granted standard airworthiness certificates by the Civil Aviation Administration of China.

The cities had entered a strategic partnership with EHang in October to establish a leading position in the emerging low-altitude economy industry, the company said in a news release following the demonstrations.