Aviation News

In testimony (PDF) before a House Aviation Subcommittee, AOPA President Mark Baker urged continued funding for airports because they are the true backbone of aviation. The hearing was convened by Aviation Subcommittee Chairman Frank LoBiondo, R-N.J., who is also a member of the House General Aviation Caucus, to consider how anticipated growth in air traffic […]

Bombardier Aerospace announced that its Challenger 350 aircraft has been awarded Transport Canada Certification. Bombardier expects certification from the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration to be received shortly. According to Bombardier, the Challenger 350 will carry as many as eight passengers 3200 nm and cruise as fast as Mach 0.80 under optimal conditions. Power is provided […]

Harking back to the 1930s when downtown rooftops became runways as major newspapers flew autogyros from the tops of their buildings, Nick Macomber, in partnership with the Smithsonian Channel, made a 30-second jetpack flight from the roof of the Four Seasons Hotel in Denver, Colo. Dubbed the Go Fast Jet Pack, Macombers Thursday sunrise flight […]

At its Gunskirchen, Austria factory, Rotax on Thursday rolled out its 50,000th 912-series aircraft engine and celebrated the 25th anniversary of the engine family with a fly-in at the nearby Wels airport. Manufacturers from around Europe flew in Rotax-powered aircraft for sales demos. The company combined the event with an annual homecoming of Can-Am Spyder […]

Our review of the weeks aviation news turned up stories including delivery of the 500th Phenom family jet, word that the application window has opened for this years AirVenture Cup race, ALPAs praise for the progress of NextGen, and an announcement that Airbus just delivered three of its heli-lift EC225 helicopters for duty in Africa. […]

This week has seen two seen two military jet crashes, fortunately with no serious injuries. The first, a Marine AV-8B Harrier, impacted in a residential neighborhood in Imperial, Calif., at 4:20 PDT on Wednesday, destroying three homes and leading to the evacuation of eight others. The pilot ejected safely and was hospitalized for evaluation. The […]

SkyCrafts SD-1 single-place Minisport has completed flight testing successfully, meeting all the performance requirements needed for S-LSA Certification. According to the companys report, the aircraft has good longitudinal and latitudinal stability and exhibited no issues with flutter, vibration or dangerous stall/spin tendencies. SkyCraft was able to verify the performance specifications for the SD-1 achieved by […]

The last plane to undergo maintenance inside Boeing Wichitas facility, an E-4B, started its engines and took off Thursday. It flew to the south, then gracefully turned back north for a final goodbye pass before disappearing from sight. A fixture in Wichita, Kan., since 1927, Boeing once employed as many as 40,000 people there. It […]

Virgin Galactic, the privately funded space company owned by Sir Richard Bransons Virgin Group and Abu Dhabis aabar Investments PJS, and Spaceport America announcedthat they have signed a joint agreement with the Federal Aviation Administration that helps clear the path for commercial flights of SpaceShipTwo. The agreement sets out the parameters for how routine space […]

As spring moves towards summer our weekly review of what’s going on in aviation on SocialFlight reveals more and more events, especially pure, grassroots, small airport fly-ins. The first one we ran across, right in the heart of the country, is in Central City, Neb., where there will be a fly-in breakfast and lunch, on […]