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Amazon, which is developing drones to make package deliveries, received its long-awaited experimental airworthiness certificatefrom the FAAon Thursday. The approval allows Amazon to test its unmanned aerial systems in the U.S. while proposed commercial drone regulations await the rulemaking process. The certificate, requested by Amazon in July, allows the company to make flights no higher […]

The federal employee whose drone crashed on the White House lawn in January won’t be charged by prosecutors, but the FAA will continue to investigate the incident, The Associated Press reported Wednesday. Shawn Usman, an employee of the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency, was flying a borrowed DJI quadcopter in the early hours of Jan. 26 when […]

NASA engineers are now testing an airplane wing fitted with 18 electric motors, and they plan to replace the wings and engine of a Tecnam P2006T with an improved version of the system within the next two years. The project, called LEAPTech, for Leading Edge Asynchronous Propeller Technology, “is a key element of NASA’s plan […]

After a two-hour delay, Solar Impulse launched on the third leg of its global journey just after sunrise on Wednesday, departing from Ahmedabad, in India.Pilot Andre Borschberg waited patiently as administrative delays kept the solar-powered aircraft on the ground,despite perfect weather. The team needed “a piece of paper to be signed off” from customs, according […]

The FAA this week released its annual aviation forecast for the next 20 years, predicting growth for the turbine and rotorcraft fleets but downturns in sales of most fixed-wing piston airplanes. The business jet market grew in 2014 for the first time since 2008, and the forecast predicts “robust growth” in that sector over the […]

A United Airlines flight crew heading for Denver made a U-turn and returned to Dulles Airport, near Washington, D.C., Monday night after passengers subdued a man who had run toward the cockpit in a threatening way. “Declaring an emergency due to a passenger disturbance,” one of the flight crew told ATC. “He ran forward toward […]

Aeromobil plans to start sales of its two-seat flying car by 2017, CEO Juraj Vaculik said on Sunday at the South by Southwest festival in Austin, Texas. And if those sales go well enough, the next model will be a four-seater capable of autonomous flight, he added. The company, based in Slovakia, has been flying […]

Chinese authorities plan to build general aviation airports in most of the country’s 2,800 counties to spur economic growth, according to a report in the Global Times published on Monday. China currently has just 78 county airports. China’s economic five-year plan for 2016-20 predicts the airports could help to generate up to $44 billion in […]

The Navy is being sued for $65 million by the makers of a new type of airship after the aircraft was wrecked when the roof of a hangar it was in partially collapsed on it. Aeros says the hybrid airship itself was worth $35 million but the total losses from the mishap total $65 million. […]

The family of airshow performer Eddy Andreini, who burned to death at a California show in 2014, is alleging that Air Force firefighters were away from their trucks “taking pictures of aircraft” when Andreini’s modified Stearman crashed on the main runway at Travis Air Force Base. In a lawsuit filed last week in California, the […]