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echelon
Imagine losing your balance and falling off.

With guard rails and fully enclosed rotor blades, it might've worked. I can't think of anywhere to deploy it where it would have advantages over other modes of transportation. Desert, coastlines, ... but then what for? Landmine detection? It's also really loud, so no public or residential deployment.

And even if it had been hardened and dummy proofed, disruption of the blades would not have had many safe failure modes.

marginalia_nu
> Imagine losing your balance and falling off.

He seems to be fastened both at the feet and at the hip with some sort of wire, so I don't think he actually can fall off. But still.

jcun4128
Sensor that detects something about hit the rotors, detaches the blades via explosive bolts, takes out not one person but more.
echelon
The world doesn't deserve such an incredible marvel of engineering.
berkes
> Imagine losing your balance and falling off.

Or a sudden dog running across the field. Or checking your insta-feed and overlooking that group at the wedding crossing the park.

djmips
There was a ducted fan version of this type of craft, a little more famous. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hiller_VZ-1_Pawnee
evgen
The Hiller flying platform is a rather cool gadget and Bay-area folks can see one at the Hiller Aviation Museum in San Carlos. With all of the wacky vehicles people have made using jumped-up quadcopter designs or small jet engines I am really surprised no one has tried to make a new version of this aircraft.
cdiamand
My palms are sweating after watching that. Risk incarnate.

That being said, I wish modern news and video had more of the magic from this time period when it comes to composition. Love the music and the narrative voice.

_joel
I wonder why it never caught on?
dvh
Do you want your neighbors to have flying cars?
littlestymaar
Such a flying “car”? Best way to have ground meat everywhere in your garden if said neighbor makes the smallest mistake…
dang
Can anybody figure out the year?
tantalor
1954
dang
How do you know that?
thangalin
The DH-4 was made in 1954, followed by the HZ-1 in 1956. The video shows N64N in the video, but the N64N-1 didn't have water applications.

Sources:

https://abpic.co.uk/pictures/view/1140732

> It is the only surviving HZ-1. The prototype, designated DH-4 ...

https://transportation.army.mil/museum/coldwar/index.html

> The HZ-1 was tested at Fort Eustis in 1956.

https://archive.org/stream/ArmedForcesFilms1956/ArmedForcesF...

> IESM-543 . Released July 1956 ... The Aerocycle is an experimental one man flying machine.

http://www.aviastar.org/helicopters_eng/lockner_helicovector...

> DH-4 first flew in January 1955.

https://asc.army.mil/docs/magazine2/armyalt-oct-dec-15.pdf

> In 1954, he proposed that if the rotors of a helicopter were on the bottom, a pilot could use his own weight to steer the vehicle using kinesthetic control, similar to riding a bicycle.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/De_Lackner_HZ-1_Aerocycle

> First flight 22 November 1954

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VyBHM1vZLzc

> The De Lackner DH-4 "Aerocycle", later renamed the HZ-1 Aerocycle

mdturnerphys
Oh, wow, that brings back some nostalgia. There's a picture of this in one of Richard Scarry's non-Busytown books that I had as a child.
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monkeycantype
A friend of mine (miles van dorssen) built one of these and flew it in the park. I’d possibly been a little dubious until he found the old 80s handicam he filmed on, and I got to watch the tape through the viewfinder. In that tiny window I saw miles in a bike helmet hovering two feet in the on a violently shaking lawnmower quadcopter. I don’t know how google able miles is but he builds great things