PORT ANGELES — A day after the space-age LEVX transportation system was unveiled publicly in Olympia, Magna Force Inc. officials say they are being swamped with phone calls.
But they say they are still waiting on calls from federal officials who have a say in transportation and research and development funding.
Company officials say the space-age technology, which uses brick-sized magnets to levitate a platform above a magnetic rail, could be used to move people, vehicles and freight.
“The phone has been definitely ringing off the hook,” Magna Force spokeswoman Karen Rogers of Port Angeles said Thursday. “The impact of the true unveiling has been phenomenal.
“It definitely shook some people up down there,” Rogers said. “It was a heck of a day in Olympia.”
Most of the calls are coming from people looking for jobs, businesses trying to get involved and directors for Magna Force, the Port-Angeles based company founded by magnetic researcher Jerry Lamb.
“You can see people are asking questions,” Rogers said. “And I did receive a call from the Washington (state) Department of Transportation.”
That call was apparently in response to budget questions raised by Gov. Gary Locke after he watched the LEVX system lift a Chevrolet Corvette using only a magnetic field Wednesday.
Rogers said she did not receive any calls from federal officials or Washington’s two U.S. senators — Patty Murray and Maria Cantwell.
Murray leads a Senate transportation appropriations subcommittee.
The rest of this story appears in today’s Peninsula Daily News Clallam County edition. Click on “Subscribe” to get the PDN delivered to your home or office.
