The Antonov An-225 Mriya was the heaviest and longest aircraft in the world until it was destroyed in February 2022. With a wingspan of 88.4 meters, it was a brute appearance. The unique aircraft was recently only used for heavy loads and special cargo and could load up to 250 tons. However, what the British company Droneliner is now planning could make the Antonow seem downright small.
According to the young start-up, cargo drones will complement and revolutionize the global movement of goods in the future. Of course you need space for this.
Up to 350 tons of cargo per flight
Droneliner has two models in mind: the DL200 and the DL350. The DL350 would be the top model in this line-up – and, if built, should be able to transport up to 350 tons of cargo in more than 80 containers. Droneliner plans a range of up to 12,000 kilometers.
Such planes should then be particularly suitable for the fast and efficient transport of goods within a day, where no crew or other aviation limitations cause time delays. This makes a droneliner particularly suitable for transporting food and medicine. Droneliner even explicitly speaks of flowers, which seems a bit strange when you’re talking about hundreds of tons of cargo.
The design of the aircraft should offer several special features: By omitting the cockpit, loading and unloading should be particularly quick, and operating costs should be kept low by a new type of wing design, the so-called “truss-braced design”. This design currently only exists in wind tunnel models and is expected to be used for the first time on a Boeing prototype in 2028.
Huge capital requirement
Design coordinator and company director Mike Debens revealed that a lot of money would be needed to implement the project. He estimated the necessary investment at “ten billion US dollars or more”, which is a lot of money for a young company without established products.
Whether one or even both drones will ever become reality is still completely open. Due to the complexity of financing, the company is also planning versions for the military in order to appeal to a larger number of potential investors.
Sources: Droneliner, Realize