US close to unveiling flying car as Iran reveals hybrid flying boat squadron

Melbourne, Oct 4 (ANI): Two major superpowers - US and Iran - have been involved in building flying hybrid vehicles presumably for patrol and reconnaissance.

While US is close to unveiling a helicopter-Humvee, Iran reportedly already has several squadrons of small reconnaissance boat-planes called Bavar 2.

Both are designed to move between air and ground or water as easily as possible.

The basic functionality of the US vehicle seems to be that it is a Humvee with Vertical Take-Off and Landing (VTOL) capabilities.

The "flying boat" is intended to be used for both patrol and reconnaissance, and is apparently able to evade radar, presumably by flying at low altitudes.

"High waves have no effect on them, they can carry out surveillance operations with night vision cameras and electronic systems," News.com.au quoted the Iranian Minister of Defence, Bridigier General Ahmad Vahidi, as saying.

Although some experts argue that the vehicles may be technically weak, in that they wouldn't be all that stealthy, Iran's deployment still puts them ahead in the de facto hybrid vehicle-combination race against America, which has only just put pen to paper on their own new military concept.

However, neither of these hybrid vehicles are likely to make the jump over to civilian use in the near future, unlike US start-up Terrafugia, which early last month announced it was ready to begin low-volume production of its hybrid vehicle, the Transition Roadable Aircraft. (ANI)