Business & Military

Famed aerobatic pilot and aircraft designer Walter Extra has set a new FAI record for time to climb in an electric airplane. According to Extra and Siemens, the manufacturer of the motor used in the Extra 330LE, the climb was 4:22 to an altitude of 3000 meters (9842 feet). That’s an average climb rate of […]

I know it’s fashionable to decry flying on the airlines as the mass transportation equivalent of a slave ship, but I’ve trained myself to tune out the insults and degradations of airline travel. The airlines usually get you there at a fare less than you can fly yourself over the same distance. That’s just economic […]

President-elect Donald Trump said in a tweet Tuesday morning that Boeing’s costs for the next Air Force One, now in development, are “out of control,” and added, “Cancel order!” The costs, according to Trump, are already up to more than $4 billion. Boeing responded with a short statement, noting that “We are currently under contract […]

U.S. pilots now can buy a factory-built FAA-type-certified autogyro for the first time “probably in at least 60 years,” Bob Snyder, program manager at AutoGyroUSA, told AVweb on Monday. The Calidus autogyro, which has been flying in Europe since 2009, recently was awarded a type certificate in the seldom-used Part 23 primary category by FAA […]

An unknown number of passengers and crew were injured when a Qatar Airways Boeing 777 flying from Washington to Doha hit severe turbulence and made an emergency landing in the Azores. Flight 708 was almost five hours into the 14-hour flight Saturday when it hit three minutes’ worth of really rough air. Passengers tweeted accounts […]

Rockwell Collins’ purchase of aircraft interior finisher B/E Aerospace has attracted the attention of some Wall Street wheeler-dealers who are suggesting it is Rockwell Collins itself that should be up for sale. Starboard Value, a hedge fund that specializes in investing in undervalued companies, has purchased an unknown amount of Rockwell Collins stock in recent […]

At AVweb, we’re expanding our news operation and we’re looking for an aviation writer/editor. The successful candidate will have a proven track record in reporting and writing about aviation or technical topics. We need a self-starter with a good eye for enterprise news and the ability to reliably meet weekly news deadlines without strict supervision. […]

VSS Unity, Virgin Galactic’s replacement for the original SpaceShipTwo, which crashed in October of 2014, glided to a landing for the first time Saturday after three months of captive testing slung below WhiteKnightTwo. The 2014 crash killed copilot Michael Alsbury and injured pilot Peter Siebold. Unity separated from the mothership at 10:40 a.m. PST and […]

NASA had two successful launches of its largest scientific balloons this week in Antarctica as part of a three-flight series on behalf of university researchers studying components of outer space. The project, NASA’s Antarctica Long Duration Balloon Flight Campaign, uses unmanned balloons with 40 million cubic feet of volume, as big as a football stadium, […]

AVweb’s search of aviation news worldwide found announcements from Tecnam, theHayward Air Rally, the National Business Aviation Association andAble Flight.Tecnam has introduced a substantially updated and improved Mark 2 version of the company’s popular P2002 Sierra. The Tecnam P2002 Sierra MkII now offers an improved cabin for greater comfort, top level avionics, new paint colors […]