Interesting Airplanes

A Virginia company may have created a new category for the burgeoning advanced air mobility sector when it flew its eSTOL hybrid electric Goldfinch on Nov. 19. The aircraft is powered by a “turbogenerator” that charges batteries to supply electricity to eight motors on the high wing. The motors provide blown lift over the wings, […]

A New Zealand company says it’s solved one of the biggest safety issues affecting amphibious aircraft operations. Paul Vickers, president of Vickers Aircraft, told AVweb the WAVE pusher amphib will not flip if the pilot forgets to raise the landing gear before a water landing. Vickers declined to discuss the flip-proof design in detail for […]

The highly classified B-21 Raider took its first flight on Friday and there was nothing secretive about it. The aircraft took off from Palmdale Airport in California on a bluebird day with hundreds of people watching from the roads ringing the airport. The stealth bomber that will eventually replace the B-2 Spirit is optionally piloted […]

Switchblade, the flying car concept developed over the last 14 years, flew for the first time Thursday according to a YouTube video posted by the company. The aircraft, which is powered by a hybrid electric drive system that supplies power to the pusher prop in the air and the wheels on the road, did at […]

IEEE Spectrum is reporting the FAA has issued a special airworthiness certificate to allow Google founder Sergey Brin’s LTA Research to flight test a 400-foot-long hybrid-electric airship, Pathfinder 1, at Moffett Field near San Francisco. LTA has been building the massive aircraft, the largest since the Hindenburg, since 2015. A second larger airship, which is […]

Tecnam says the STOL version of its P2012 Traveller twin will be certified by the end of this year and deliveries will begin in January. In a news release at NBAA-BACE in Las Vegas, the company said the test aircraft has met or exceeded performance expectations and is ready to serve the remote and challenging […]

A partnership between electric seaglider manufacturer REGENT and regional air mobility platform Surf Air Mobility is set to bring all-electric seaglider operations to South Florida. The partnership, announced Oct. 12, will establish a hub in Miami providing passenger transport service routes from Miami, Fort Lauderdale, Palm Beach and the Caribbean Islands. According to the announcement, […]

A British company says its proposed cargo drones can carry up to 80 standard lightweight 20-foot shipping containers using “hybrid turbofan” engines that can use sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) and hydrogen. Droneliner is proposing two models of its massive aircraft, the DL 200 that can carry 200 tons and the DL 350 that can pack […]

Textron subsidiary Pipistrel Aircraft flew the first piloted liquid hydrogen-powered electric aircraft last Friday. The HEAVEN project HY4 demonstrator took off from Maribor, Slovenia, with two pilots onboard and “demonstrated safe and efficient operation throughout multiple flight tests,” the company said. The hydrogen is used by a fuel cell that creates electricity for the electric […]

A New Zealand company has flown a new amphibious aircraft that will likely benefit from the new MOSAIC rules when they come into force. The Vickers WAVE uses the Rotax 916 engine with a constant speed prop to power what looks like a bulked-up ICON A5 and has numbers to match. The company says the […]