Airbus taking its time with innovative ‘foot locker’ concept

An innovative concept to increase storage space for passengers on airlines is still a long way off becoming a reality.

The clever idea that won a team of Hong Kong uni students the airbus "fly your ideas” competition. Picture: Supplied

An innovative concept to increase storage space for passengers on airlines is still a long way off becoming a reality, despite taking out the Airbus Fly Your Ideas competition last year.

The under-the-seat private stowage compartment or “foot locker”, impressed the judges of the biennial competition, which received 350 entries in 2017.

The winning Team DAElead from the University of Hong Kong pocketed $45,000 in prize money for their idea, which beat an Australian entry.

Making use of the space between the cabin floor and the cargo ceiling of an aircraft was seen as a simple but effective way to keep personal items secure without the hassle of fighting for room in the overhead lockers.

But an Airbus spokesman told The Australian it was still too early to say if the idea would be incorporated into their aircraft designs in the future.

“Many of the proposals submitted during the Fly Your Ideas competitions were already being studied or explored within Airbus and the aerospace industry in general,” he said.

“Not all of them will find their way on to Airbus aircraft or into Airbus processes but many have been shared with specialists throughout Airbus for further consideration.”

He said since 2013, all rights to designs and creations from teams entering the Fly Your Ideas competition belonged to their developers, giving the students and their universities the chance to decide what to do should they want to progress their ideas further.

Team DAElead including Darwing Li Kin-wing, Leo Lo Kwun-yu, Stewart Leung Ng Shu-wai and Hayden Li Hean-ting, said they had continued to develop their “foot locker” idea during their final year of mechanical engineering at university.

“We have kind of polished the idea with more calculation in structure, material aspects and implemented a better opening mechanism,” said the team members.

“We will further work on it in the future.”

The engineers also revealed they had come up with another “novel idea” using drones to pre-alert traffic that emergency vehicles such as fire trucks or ambulances were coming up behind them.

Since graduating from university, three of the four have embarked on jobs in aviation, including as a cadet pilot with ­Cathay Pacific, an engineer with the same airline, and another was doing flight training.

“For Hayden, he has just finished his one year internship in a local railway company,” the team said.

Airbus recently issued the call for the “next generation of innovators” to enter its sixth Fly Your Ideas competition.

Open to university teams from across the world, the competition encourages students to “unleash their pioneering spirit, working at the cutting edge of digital technology alongside industry experts”.

Previous years’ winners have included an idea to harness natural energy from the vibrations or flex of an aircraft’s wings, and an air-cushion luggage loading and unloading system for aircraft cargo compartments.