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The Beta Technologies Alia CX300 on display at the NBAA White Plains Regional Forum.
WEST HARRISON, New York — Beta Technologies’ next stop after conducting the historic first passenger-carrying, all-electric demonstration flight at JFK International Airport was Westchester County Airport outside of White Plains, New York, where it logged another first.
Beta displayed its Alia CX300 conventional takeoff and landing variant (CTOL) June 4 at the NBAA White Plains Regional Forum at the county airport—the first time a flying advanced air mobility aircraft has appeared at an NBAA regional conference. Westchester County Airport (HPN) is located about 38 road miles north of JFK.
This was not Beta Technologies’ first time at HPN, however. In February 2023, Beta and charter flight provider Blade Air Mobility conducted a joint flight test of the Alia-250 electric vertical takeoff and landing (eVTOL) variant at the airport, the first such piloted eVTOL flight in the New York City area, the companies said at the time. That aircraft flew to Westchester County from Beta’s flight-test facility in Plattsburgh, New York, making a stop in Schenectady to recharge its batteries.
The “production-intent” Alia CX300 that landed at JFK on June 3 originated at Beta’s headquarters in Burlington, Vermont, flew about two hours to East Hampton Airport on Long Island, then continued another 42 minutes to JFK. A mobile charging vehicle followed by road to recharge the aircraft.
Four Passengers And Pilot
Beta CEO and founder Kyle Clark piloted the final leg to JFK. On board were Republic Airways President Matt Koscal and Blade Air Mobility CEO Rob Weisenthal, along with Beta’s test pilot and two employees.
The Alia CX300 aircraft completed a six-week coast-to-coast tour of the U.S. in April, flying more than 8,000 nm. Beta also is building a network of high-speed charging sites across the country.
“To make electric aviation work, you need the planes, you need the pilots and you need the charging infrastructure,” said Alia instructor pilot Nate Dubie. “We’re working on all three of those. We have 50 charge sites that are active and working at airports right now and another 40 or 50 that are under construction or permitting, mostly on the East Coast.”
The flight into JFK was conducted in partnership with the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, which in December 2023 issued a request for proposals to demonstrate next-generation aircraft at one of the airports it manages in the New York City metropolitan area.
“We operate in Class B and Class C airspace,” said Beta Technologies Head of Commercial Aircraft Sales Patrick Buckles, who participated in a panel discussion at the NBAA forum. “If you’re something new and novel and you need a lot of permissions, you’re not going into JFK. We want to show that this can be integrated into the airspace. We want to function alongside other aircraft in a way that controllers and others [are] used to.”
A second production-intent Alia CX300 will conduct a cargo operational demonstration in Norway with customer Bristow this summer.
—With reporting by Graham Warwick.
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