Flying Cars: The Future is Now
For many, many years now scientists and sci-fi writers have been promising us flying cars. But so far, these vehicles have not made an appearance on our roadways or skyways. As a veteran motor sports photographer, however, I can tell you that flying cars do exist, and I have per sally made many sightings at racetracks around the country over the past 30 years. The most recent example was just this past weekend at Barber Motorsports Park near Birmingham, Alabama, when the green Ford Mustang pictured above made a brief flight after touching wheels with an Aston Martin shortly after the start of the race.
Over the years, there have been numerous reports of flying cars at an uphill section of the Lime Rock road course in Lakeville, CN. I myself documented several instances of flying cars at tis location, such as the Porsche, pictured above at a Grand-Am race in 2007. A more recent track modification has grounded all the cars for the time being at Lime Rock.
No less than the famous NASCAR Hall of Famer Rusty Wallace himself has piloted a flying car on more than one occasion. I , among others, recorded his well documented flight of a Pontiac Le Mans at Daytona in 1993. Wallace, however, has yet to "stick" a landing!
One of my earliest photographs of a flying car took place at Daytona in a 1987 Daytona 500 qualifier. Phil Barkdoll slid sideways on the front stretch before, to everyone's surprise, his Oldsmobile headed skyward, the direct result of the recent downsizing of NASCAR stock cars in the 1980's Apparently the smaller, light cars did just fine when running a high speed in a nose-forward attitude. When the cars presented their sides or rears to the wind, however, the drivers quickly became pilots !
SO, while we still await the arrival of flying cars on the public roadways of the world, they are already a fairly common sight on our racetracks, although the flights do not tend to be of very long duration, and landings remain a problem.
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www.bcpix.com is the online home for the photographic archive of Florida-based photographer Brian Cleary. At this portal not only can you search and browse an ever-growing collection of photography covering more than 30 years, but many of the images are available for online purchase as editorial images, commercial images and/or personal use prints.