Flight Safety

AVweb’s Flight Safety section offers in-depth coverage of aviation safety topics, including accident analyses, risk management strategies, regulatory updates, and pilot training insights. Designed for pilots, instructors, and aviation professionals, this section provides timely information to enhance situational awareness and promote best practices in flight operations.

Branson Says Crash Cause Will Be Found

An atypically restrained Richard Branson told reporters on Saturday his Virgin Galactic will find the cause of Friday’s catastrophic loss of SpaceShipTwo but he’s making no predictions about how long it will delay his dream of carrying “ordinary people” to space. “We are not going to push on blindly,” Branson said shortly after his arrival […]

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SpaceShipTwo Loss: A Harsh Reality Check

Friday’s loss of Virgin Galactic’s SpaceShipTwo was as inevitable was it was tragic. If anyone believes-as I think some do-that attaching “tourism” to space flight somehow erases the risk of flight beyond the atmosphere, this accident should disabuse them of that notion. But I wonder if it will. Promoting space tourism has gotten quite beyond […]

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Virgin Galactic’s SpaceShipTwo Crashes

One test pilot has died and another has been seriously injured in the crash of Virgin Galactic’s SpaceShipTwo during a test flight from Mojave Air and Space Port, California. The company said that the spacecraft suffered an anomaly that resulted in loss of the vehicle. Parachutes were reportedly sighted in the area. One witness said […]

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Antares Rocket Destroyed Intentionally

Shortly after liftoff of Orbital Sciences Corporation’s Antares Rocket from the Wallops Flight Facility, Virginia on Tuesday, Oct. 28, it became apparent to the operators that there was a problem with the launch and they hit the destruct button. Barron Beneski, vice president of corporate communications at Orbital, confirmed that the flight termination system was […]

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Podcast: Flying Classroom Reaches Australia

Barrington Irving of Experience Aviation is on the first leg of a flight around the world in a Hawker jet to help teach school kids about science and technology. He spoke with AVweb’s Mary Grady during a stopover in Australia about the project, the jet, and the expeditions he’s taking part in along the way. […]

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Flying Classroom’ Circles The Pacific

Barrington Irving, leader of the nonprofit group Experience Aviation, is more than halfway through a circum-Pacific flight that is bringing the world into classrooms around the country, as seen from a Hawker 400XP jet. “The reason why we’re doing this,” Irving said, in a recent interview with AVweb from his hotel room in Darwin, Australia, […]

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King Air Crashes Into Wichita FlightSafety Building

A Beechcraft B200 King Air crashed through the roof of one of the FlightSafety International buildings on Wichita’s Mid-Continent Airport this morning. Reports indicate that the airplane lost an engine on takeoff and the pilot said he was going to return and land. The lone occupant of the aircraft was pilot Mark Goldstein, a contract […]

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Antares Explosion Video From The Air

A passenger in a GA airplane caught Tuesday’s Antares rocket explosion on video, giving a view of it from the air over the commercial launch facility in Virginia. The unmanned supply rocket exploded Tuesday seconds after liftoff. The video, which lasts under two minutes, is shot from the right side with the launch site some […]

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Electric Airplanes: A Tough Paradigm Shift

At this week’s Redbird Migration conference, I wrote a short straightnews piece quoting the proposed direct operating costs for an electric trainer of about $5 an hour. That number came from George Bye, whose Aero Electric Aircraft Corp. appears poised to bring an electric-powered trainer to market within…well, it’s on the horizon. A couple of […]

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