Recent Updates

As the FAA sorts out the mess created when its drone registration rule was struck down by the courts, it’s already thinking about taking the registration requirement to the next level and requiring operators to transmit their registration information. The drone website wetalkuav.com reported that the first meeting of the FAA’s UAS Identification and Tracking […]

Crew members and passengers aboard a Delta Air Lines flight from Seattle headed for China Thursday evening weaponized wine bottles and anything else they could think of to subdue a young passenger who was hell bent on opening a galley exit door. According to an FBI affidavit, Joseph Hudek IV, 23, was finally subdued after […]

The FAA is soliciting applicationsfor new civilian air traffic controllers (Air Traffic Control Specialist Trainee—ATCS), but if you want to be considered, you’d better be fast. The application window opens today, July 7, and closes July 14. Short application windows are the norm for the FAA. When the FAA last hired for the ATCS position […]

The House and Senate versions of the FAA reauthorization bill, while they famously differ on whether to privatize the national airspace system, agree that the FAA should study its current prohibition on supersonic flight in U.S. civil airspace. Supersonic flight by civil aircraft is only permitted in the United States either over water or in […]

Some owners of drones who registered their aircraft with the FAA will be eligible for a refund of their $5 registration fee and deletion of their data, says the agency. Starting just before Christmas 2015, the FAA started requiring operators of unmanned aerial systems weighing more than 0.55 pounds (one quarter of a kilogram) to […]

Zhejiang Geely Holding Group, a Chinese conglomerate that owns the Volvo and Lotus automobile brands, has agreed to buy the Terrafugia flying-car company, according to a report in the South China Morning Post. The XConomy Boston website also reported on the sale, saying they have “independently been tracking rumors about the acquisition.” Terrafugia CEO Carl […]

A 747 that has been parked at Quonset State Airport in Rhode Island for a couple of years now is being transformed into a replica of Air Force One, according to a local news station. The 747 first flew into the airport in Evergreen livery in June 2015, and has been sitting outside through rain, […]

Most folks in the U.S. may be taking holiday time this week, but general aviation advocates are not slowing down in their effort to oppose efforts in Washington to privatize air traffic control. Thirty-four groups signed on to a letter on Monday that says the House bill submitted by Rep. Bill Shuster, R-Pa., — the […]

It all started a few decades ago in a place 8500 miles away. Walt Fricke was in the copilot’s seat of an Army helo in the midst of the chaos of a combat assault in Vietnam. When the crew fired the air-to-ground rockets, one exploded leaving the tube. Shrapnel blasted into one of Walt’s legs, […]

A Skywest CRJ700 was evacuated on a taxiway at Denver International Airport Sunday after an engine caught fire as it was taxiing to the gate. “After landing safely at Denver, SkyWest Flight 5869, a CRJ700 operating as United Express from Aspen to Denver, experienced engine issues,” Skywest said in a statement. “All 59 passengers safely […]