This whole thread started because someone brought up the potential future of EV planes. But people keep talking about todays solutions. Electric planes are in their infancy. Many battery technologies and other electrical energy storage technologies are rapidly solving the problems of today's batteries.

Car fires happen, so do plane fires. They also have batteries that you can put a bunch of nails through and all that happens is they lose a small amount of capacity. Those batteries are on the market today. Not in mass quantities. But to think that a future battery couldn't hold far more capacity than today's batteries and be safe and have enough other good parameters for aviation is silly.

You're thinking very much in terms of "What can be done with today's electric propulsion and storage technology?" In 30 years will electric planes be more common? Will leaded avgas for small piston planes still be the only common option? Think of where batteries have gone in the last 20 years. Where will they be in 30 years from now? What amazing breakthroughs in lab batteries in the last 10 years are being fleshed out and readied for production in the next 5-10 years? Or even today. Like Amprius doubling the Wh/kg with 1/2 the Wh/L of the previous reigning champs. See how it starts to get difficult to say that electric powered craft will never be viable for your 500 mile trip? Unless engines make some big leap in efficiency that they haven't done in the last century and can suddenly use even half of the 45 kWh/kg available to them and just run away with the range crown, it's possible for ev aircraft to become a viable option in our lifetimes and not just a neat party trick.