Glenn Martin has unveiled at the Experimental Aircraft Association's AirVenture in Oshkosh, Wis. the world's first jetpack which promises to actually be usable. The contraption can theoretically fly for 30 minutes, and rise to a height of 8,000 feet. However, the Martin Jetpack was only used at very low heights, around a few feet, for safety reasons. In the upcoming months, its creator wants to fly it at 500 feet.

Inventor Glenn Martin wants to sell the devices for $100,000. The Martin Jetpack weighs 250lbs and is 5 feet tall. Power is provided by piston engines, not jet engines, but the twin blades are encased in special ducts. The 200-horsepower gasoline engine also makes a lot of noise, it appears.

Since 1998, Martin managed to secure investments and has a staff of 12. Its corporate partners are from New Zealand. Although having a background in pharmaceutical sales and biotech rather than engineering, jetpacks have preoccupied Glenn Martin for almost thirty years.

A pilot license is not necessary to fly a Martin Jetpack. It is classified an ultralight aircraft by the FAA. However, buyers will be required to take 15 hours of flight training as well as a safety screening. Those who do not pass will have to give up their jetpack and they'll receive their money back.

Each jetpack is equipped with a ballistic parachute, but it is by far more dangerous than most other current flying options, Glenn Martin admits, but hopes to sell between 10 and 20 devices by this time next year.

The first jet packs, as most of today's technical achievements, were built by German scientists during World War II. It consisted of two wearable shortened Schmidt pulse jet tubes attached to the body, one in front and one in the back. It was designed to allow jumps of up to 180 ft at low altitude, under 50 ft, in order to cross minefields, barbed wire obstacles, and bridgeless waters. It was designed for engineer units and not troops.

The only other working jetpacks today are hydrogen peroxide-powered ones, which allow for flights under 30 seconds. The U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) designed a jet pack which tested well in 1969, but after the chief designer of the Bell Jet Flying Belt died the same year, the project was abandoned.