briefs

It’s as good a reason to fly as any and sometimes the reward is a big, wet kiss. Flying Paws, a non-profit group of Arizona pilots, fatten their logbooks by getting abandoned pets away from shelters, where they may face euthanasia, and into new, loving homes. Marilyn Butler Subach founded the program a year ago […]

It’s a tale of two cities, aviation style. As Naples, Fla., celebrates the resumption of commercial air service to its municipal airport, New Jersey congressman Steve Rothman (D-N.J.) is trumpeting a new provision that has banished scheduled charter service from Teterboro (known to some as the busiest GA airport in the country). Reporters and TV […]

As autographs go, this one could be one of the most historic aviation artifacts around. Scientists at the National Center for Forensic Science will examine a swatch of cloth that may be from the original Wright Flyer and signed by Orville Wright. Jack and Sandy Schweinsberg, of Eustis, Fla., bought the framed piece of cloth […]

Trees, and a local council’s unwillingness to pay to have them removed, are threatening Danbury Municipal Airport in Connecticut. The FAA and the state are willing to pay 97 percent of the $4.5 million cost. But Mayor Mark Boughton said the airport is a drain on civic coffers and he’s reluctant to spend any more […]

Protesters made a dent in security measures, not to mention the Enola Gay, in an apparently well-planned but poorly executed attempt to make their mark on the controversy that has followed the restored B-29 to its new resting place. After reportedly assuring staff at the newly opened Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center that they wouldn’t cause […]

A 63-year-old English grandmother and her 53-year-old male co-pilot are recovering in a Chilean hospital after the helicopter they were trying to fly around the world via the polar route crashed in Antarctica Saturday. Officials credit Polar First Challenge co-pilot Colin Bodill with saving Jenny Murray’s life after the chopper went down in bad weather […]

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Scaled Composites’ X Prize hopeful, SpaceShipOne, a Burt Rutan design, yesterday achieved ignition of its hybrid rocket motor, driving it to 1.2 Mach and 68,000 feet near Mojave before demonstrating its “feathered” high-drag descent feature. The aircraft reached 48,000 feet with the aid of Scaled’s White Knight turbojet host aircraft, after which the supersonic portion […]

Two Massachusetts pilots celebrated the centennial of flight on Tuesday by spending nine hours in a Skyhawk, flying in and out of each one of their state’s paved, public-use airports. Bill Herp, 41, and Doug Barth, 47, a former flight instructor, landed at 36 of the 40 airports on Tuesday, missing out on four remote […]