Airbus

Since its inception early last year, the goal for Airbus’ Vahana project was to fly a full-size prototype of the VTOL aircraft by the end of this year, and have a “productizable demonstrator by 2020.” This week, the A³ team took one step closer to that goal by moving the Vahana to its new home […]

Just two weeks after an Air France Airbus A380 enroute to Los Angeles from Paris made an emergency landing at Goose Bay Labrador, following the failure of an engine fan hub, the FAA issued an Emergency Airworthiness Directive against the airplane’s Engine Alliance GP7200 series powerplants. The Air France A380’s number four engine on September […]

Okay, so it’s not a flying car in the sense we grew up imagining, but Airbus A^3’s octocopter personal aerial vehicle, Vahana, is still quite impressive. Utilizing eight propellers mounted on rotating wings, Vahana is capable of vertical take-off and horizontal flight. The landing, however, is where it gets tricky. “Takeoff is fairly scripted,” Sanjiv […]

In the latest installment of our Jobs in Aviation video series, Airbus’ Senior Vice President of Strategy and Corporate Development Ken McKenzie offers insight into the hiring practices of one of the industry’s biggest companies. In North America alone, Airbus employs approximately 5,300 people, but that’s just a small piece of the pie, as the […]

Airbus is known for its commercial aircraft, and perhaps best for its A380 airliner that holds the title for the world’s largest passenger jet. At the 2017 Paris Air Show alone it secured $39.7 billion worth of new business. Now Airbus looks to expand its portfolio to include UAS services. In May, Airbus announced its […]

Airbus Helicopters unveiled a model of the high-speed demonstrator it is developing as part of the Clean Sky 2 European research program at the Paris Air Show. “Today we unveil our bold vision for the future of high-speed rotorcraft,” Airbus Helicopters CEO Guillaume Faury said in a press release. “This new project, pulling together the […]

Calls for increased lateral separation between Airbus A380s and smaller aircraft grew louder after the behemoth airliner flipped a Challenger 604 like a toy in the skies over the Arabian Sea, severely damaging the business jet and injuring a number of passengers. According to Flight Service Bureau, the international flight-planning organization, the Challenger encountered severe […]

When Ford Motor Co. chairman Bill Ford was asked at SXSW if we’d be seeing his company’s logo on a flying car anytime soon, his answer was simple: “No.” Flying car fever is gripping America’s tech-hungry population lately, as Dutch developer PAL-V announced in February that its Liberty, a three-wheel gyrocopter, is for sale and […]

Who says the era of the Airbus A380’s use is waning when clever minds can still find unique uses for the aircraft, or at least creations that look an awful lot like an A380? A select group of gardeners in Dubai, the United Arab Emirates city that doubles as home base to Emirates Airlines, think […]

Airbus, maker of airliners like the mammoth A380, also sees a market for smaller autonomous flying taxis using vertical takeoff and landing capabilities for short trips around big urban centers. The Airbus VTOL craft, carrying just a single person, would use environmentally friendly electric motors to spin the aircraft’s eight propellers. The eight propellers also […]