Pia Bergqvist

Two years after Bell Helicopter announced the 505 Jet Ranger X, the company has made progress toward the certification of the five-seat light single-engine helicopter. Five hundred seventy-five hours of flight testing have been completed on three test platforms since the first flight in November 2014, and Bell Helicopter expects certification by the end of […]

The Solar Impulse team is hard at work in Hawaii preparing the all-solar-powered Si2 for its continued journey around the world. The ambitious trip, which started last spring in Abu Dhabi, was cut short in July following a record-breaking five-day, nonstop flight across the Pacific Ocean from Japan to Hawaii, which put so much stress […]

After years of what has appeared to be a lot of talk and little action, the FAA has released a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM) for new certification rules to replace the current Part 23 regulations. If adopted, the new rules would apply to aircraft with a max seating capacity of 19 passengers and a […]

Almost exactly two years after AgustaWestland unveiled the AW109 Trekker at the 2014 Heli-Expo in Anaheim, California, the helicopter has made its first flight. The inaugural flight was successfully completed at the Finmeccanica helicopter division in Cascina Costa, Italy. Test pilots Giuseppe Afruni and Giuseppe Segreto took the controls of the Trekker and tested the […]

Piper Meridian and M500 owners can now shave some weight from their airplanes and improve performance by switching to a Hartzell composite propeller. Hartzell has achieved an STC for a five-blade propeller designed specifically for these Piper models. The weight savings with the five-blade composite propeller over the aluminum four-blade prop that comes standard with […]

Spidertracks took the opportunity at this week’s HAI Heli-Expo in Louisville, Kentucky, to introduce several new features for its Spider product offerings. The company says its new products will help operators around the world optimize their businesses through better monitoring and communication. “We want our users to know how an aircraft is flying when they […]

Republic Airways, which operates regional flights for Delta, American and United, announced recently that it is going through Chapter 11 bankruptcy. While an airline going bankrupt is not unusual news, the reason behind the announcement is. The airline blamed its problems on a shortage of pilots. “Our filing today is a result of our loss […]

An Australian aircraft icon, Seeker, will soon be manufactured here in the United States. The Seeker — an aerial surveillance aircraft that looks like a helicopter with wings — has been manufactured in Australia since the early 1990s and achieved FAA Certification about one year ago. Since then, the U.S. branch has been selling the […]

This video ranks in the “don’t try this at home” category, but we thought it was worth sharing. The video shows a skydiver jumping out of a North American T-6 Texan, the legendary advanced military trainer, which has become a staple in the warbird scene at airshows around the country. However, with its glass canopy […]

Watch out, Aerion. There may be some competition in the development of supersonic passenger airplanes in the not so distant future. NASA announced yesterday that it has awarded a $20 million contract to Lockheed Martin for the primary design of a commercially viable supersonic flight demonstrator aircraft. The ultimate goal is to produce a supersonic […]