Aviation News

Virgin Galactic CEO Richard Branson says the company will return to space before the end of the year and he’s looking forward to a trip there shortly afterward. The company essentially had to start over after losing its spacecraft SpaceShipTwo in a crash in 2014 that killed one of the two pilots onboard. There will […]

AVweb‘s weekly news roundup uncovered reports of the winner of the first Air Race 1 event in China, a free webinar for helicopter pilots and sales team member at WildBlue Aircraft. Californian racer Steve Senegal became the first person to win the Air Race 1 China Cup, which was held at Hannan City Airport in […]

Australian authorities are investigating after a sleeping pilot overflew his destination by 30 miles before waking up and turning around. The Vortex Air Navajo was on an early morning flight from Devonport, Tasmania, to King Island, which is between Tasmania and the Australian mainland. The Navajo was on autopilot and assuming a direct track from […]

Piaggio Aerospace, which is wholly owned by Mubadala, based in Abu Dhabi, says it “is no longer financially sustainable” and has entered “extraordinary administration,” a type of insolvency procedure that will allow the company to restructure its debt. In a statement, the company cited “continued uncertainty and current market conditions” and said “the key fundamental […]

Russia has announced it’s in the race to develop an electric airliner and it’s claiming it’s ahead of other countries in the pursuit. Andrei Dutov, head of the Zhukovsky Institute National Research Center, told Russian state media that his institution is making great strides toward pure electric flight. “A 500 kW electrical engine has been […]

MIT engineers have developed an aircraft propulsion system with no moving parts. A team led by Steven Barrett, an MIT professor of aerospace engineering, flew a five-pound model the width of a gymnasium using “ionic wind” to maintain flight after an initial push using bungee cords. The first flight occurred almost a year ago. After […]

In its third-quarter shipment report, GAMA has found the overall delivery of airplanes and rotorcraft increased in the first nine months of this year compared to the same period in 2017. “This is one of those few times since the great recession that we have seen all segments up in shipment numbers,” said GAMA President […]

The massive runway at the Kennedy Space Center that was the primary landing site for the Space Shuttle could again be used for privately operated space missions. The FAA has released a “Final Environmental Assessment and Finding of No Significant Impact/Record of Decision” on the Shuttle Landing Facility at the Cape. The facility encompasses 4,432 […]

A well-known Texas pilot who gave numerous rides to veterans in his P-51 “Pecos Bill” was killed along with a passenger when the warbird crashed into an apartment building parking lot in Fredericksburg, Texas, on Saturday. Cowden Ward Jr. and the unidentified passenger, believed to be a Second World War B-17 pilot, were taking part […]

This week,AVweb‘s news roundup found stories about new simulators for Central Washington University, the launch of a program for aspiring pilots, a training management system agreement for Jet2.com and flight data analysis software for Aeromexico. Central Washington University (CWU) hasawarded Seattle-based one-G simulation a contractfor five Foundation Advanced Aviation Training Devices (AATD) and a Piper […]