News

Maximum endurance test flights on highly polished commercial aircraft can be boring—taking the phrase “drilling holes in the sky” to the new flight levels—but Boeing’s flight test team has been making an effort to add some levity to the ordeal. The new Boeing 787-800 needed an 18-hour test flight as part of its ETOPS certification, […]

In an effort to cut some cost off the next presidential transport, the Air Force is reportedly in talks with Boeing to buy two 747s that had been produced for the now-bankrupt Russian airline, Transaero. The two jumbo jets were ordered by the airline in 2013, but Transaero went bankrupt in 2015, before it could […]

The total solar eclipse that will take place across the U.S. on August 21 is having a significant impact on general aviation. In Oregon, GA airports in the path of totality already are reporting that they are fully booked up for the event. Pilots will be camping out with their airplanes, beer gardens are planned […]

The Perlan II glider reached its own best altitude of 32,500 feet this week as the team plans to soar well past the existing sailplane record of 50,727 feet, set by Einar Enevoldson and Steve Fossett in Perlan I in 2006. To get the pressured, two-seat glider to the target altitude of 90,000 feet, Perlan […]

A solid-gold replica of the Apollo 11 lunar landing module that had belonged to Neil Armstrong was stolen from the Armstrong Air and Space Museum in Wapakoneta, Ohio, late Friday night, according to local police. Three of the 5-inch-high 18-karat-gold lunar module replicas were created by Cartier, in France, on a commission from the Le […]

Flying air taxis from Germany are ready to “conquer the world,” Volocopter announced on Tuesday, thanks to 25 million Euros invested by Daimler and a handful of others. “Using this fresh capital, Volocopter will further expand upon the leading technology in its purely electrically driven VTOLs, speed up the introduction process of the Volocopter serial […]

Boeing has created its own in-house avionics shop, called Boeing Avionics, to develop and produce its own avionics, the Seattle Times reported on Monday. In a memo to employees, Boeing CEO Dennis Muilenburg said the move is a “strategy to build targeted vertical capability.” Boeing had created its own in-house avionics until 2003, when it […]

While travelers have complained for years about shrinking space aboard airline flights, the FAA has elected to ignore the problem, saying it has not been shown to affect safety. But a federal court on Friday told the FAA they must “adequately address” issues raised by the advocacy group Flyers’ Rights. The petition said that since […]

NASA plans to fly an F-18 at supersonic speeds above Florida’s coastal waters later this month, producing sonic booms for a test program. The aircraft will fly at or above 32,000 feet when it goes supersonic. The flightpath is designed to keep the strongest-sounding sonic booms away from residential areas, while still producing booms above […]

With day after day of sunny skies and low humidity in Oshkosh last week, the crowds at EAA AirVenture had nothing to hamper them, and EAA this week reported record-breaking attendance numbers of 590,000, an increase of 5 percent over last year. In his closing news conference on Sunday, EAA Chairman Jack Pelton said, “It […]