Turkish team wins tanker plane contest in Germany

Taner Tüzün - ISTANBUL

A Turkish team has won a contest held among all universities in Germany on tanker planes by their “Inferno” project, in which the plane makes vertical takeoff and landing.

The project developed by Nuremberg-born Ahmet Günay Can and his team, who is doing his master’s degree in Aerospace Engineering at Stuttgart University, ranked first in the contest, which was held by the German Aerospace Center (DLR) and all universities across Germany were invited.

“We put forth our new ideas and knowledge that we gained in university education and worked day and night with my teammates for this project,” Can said, adding that they are very happy to be first.

We hope that an experienced institution will realize our project so that it will make a serious contribution to the world, Can said.

“I would like to thank my family and friends for their great support. As third generation Turkish youth in Germany, we want to achieve greater success,” he added.

The 24-year-old Can, whose family immigrated to Germany from the Central Anatolian province of Konya, also said that Bavarian Prime Minister Markus Söder was the first to congratulate.

The DLR organized the contest to gather ideas in the process of building more efficient and more affordable tanker planes equipped with new technology for forest fires that have sprawled in Central European and Mediterranean countries due to climate change and threaten people, animals and nature.