The capital city of the United Arab Emirates, Dubai, has a long-standing reputation of a place where new technologies get introduced and tested with little regard for the expenses. Virgin Hyperloop One, a company developing an innovative means of ultra-rapid tunnel-based passenger transportation, is no exception.
At a recent special event held in Dubai, Hyperloop showed an early version of the seats to be used in their passenger capsules. These come with anatomic design, high-quality leather trimming an in-built infotainment screens to keep the passengers entertained during the trip.
An early working prototype of the Hyperloop technology, dubbed XP-1, was demonstrated last year. Operating on the principle of electromagnetic levitation, the passenger capsule succeeded in taking off and traveling with an acceleration in excess of 100 km/h (60 mph) before coming to a gentle halt. The engineers have since managed to raise the capsule velocity up to 387 km/h (240 mph) and are ultimately hoping to bring it up to 1,200 km/h (745 mph). This would allow 12-minute trips between Abu-Dhabi and Dubai – an impressive feat to achieve, considering that the cities are 140 km (87 mi) apart.
Virgin Hyperloop One cooperates with the Transport Department of Dubai to build several Hyperloop tunnels to be used as a means of public transportation in the future.
Photo: hyperloop-one.com