Military Aviation

United Launch Alliance says it will be at least a week before it can try again to launch an expensive spy satellite from Cape Canaveral. Its Delta IV Heavy rocket automatically aborted starting its engines just three seconds before liftoff early Saturday. The launch had already been postponed from its Aug. 27 planned liftoff. In […]

An artificial intelligence algorithm beat an “experienced” F-16 pilot in five straight simulated dogfights in a project designed by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency on Aug. 20. The pilot was up against an AI system named Heron and the two duked it out in a Second World War-style forward firing gun battle. The human […]

A startup aviation company is proposing an optionally manned surveillance and light attack platform that it says can replace such complicated aircraft as the P-3 and P-8. Icarus Aerospace’s TAV (tactical air vehicle) is a clean-sheet design that looks a lot like a cleaned-up OV-10. Although it comes with two seats, it can also be […]

NORAD fighters fired flares to get the attention of an RV-7 pilot who blundered into the presidential TFR surrounding President Donald Trump’s Bedminster, New Jersey, golf resort on Saturday. The jets were scrambled and intercepted the homebuilt in the restricted airspace but weren’t able to raise the pilot on the radio. Shortly after the flares […]

The USAF Thunderbirds will do a full airshow performance in September but only Canadians will get to see it. Ditto the U.S. Army Golden Knights parachute team, the F-22 Raptor demo team and C-17 demo team. The London (Ontario) Airshow is going ahead Sept. 12-13 as a drive-in event with room for 2500 vehicles. The […]

Rolls-Royce announced on Tuesday that it has reached an agreement with Bell Textron to provide the propulsion system for Bell’s V-280 Valor tiltrotor. In addition to the propulsion system, Rolls-Royce will also be supplying an advanced infrared suppressor system for the Valor. Along with the Sikorsky-Boeing SB-1 Defiant, the V-280 was selected last March to […]

In a rare bit of good news for Boeing, the Department of the Air Force has awarded a contract for eight F-15EX multi-role fighters to be delivered starting in the first quarter of 2021. This part of the program is worth $1.2 billion but the U.S. Air Force plans to purchase 76 of the fighters […]

The U.S. Navy has announced the completion of the first sea trials of the Sikorsky CH-53K King Stallion heavy lift helicopter. According to the Navy, testing took place on the landing helicopter dock (LHD) amphibious assault ship USS Wasp. The two-week trials included launch and recovery operations, rotor start and shutdown, blade fold and shipboard […]

As the Air Force awaits the arrival of its new billion-dollar-plus versions of the Boeing 747-8 to replace the current aircraft used as the primary Air Force One, other countries are sorting out their own solutions to the “executive transport” requirement. The citizens of the U.K. and Canada are much less enthusiastic about ensuring their […]

The Air Force’s Office of Inspector General is investigating whether Air National Guard units were improperly used to monitor Black Lives Matter protests in Washington and Minneapolis. The investigation comes after politicians expressed concern to the Pentagon about the flights, which were captured by flight tracking websites, and their potential to violate the civil liberties […]