Aircraft

Disrupt or be disrupted. It’s one of the hard lessons emerging in today’s tech-fueled economy, in which the frenetic pace of innovation means not only seeing new ideas materialize with dizzying speed but also watching as they threaten to obliterate entire industries that came before them. We’ve glimpsed this trend in aviation already with everything […]

Since the earliest days of powered flight, propulsion technology has mattered more than anything else in humankind’s quest to break the bonds of earth and rise triumphantly into thin air. For the Wright Flyer it was a 180-pound, 12-horsepower gasoline piston engine built by Orville and Wilbur’s trusty mechanic, Charles ­Taylor. For the P-51D Mustang, […]

Solar Impulse 2 is stuck on the ground in Hawaii after suffering “irreversible” battery damage caused by overheating during its record-setting, five-day flight from Nagoya, Japan, project leaders said. The solar-powered airplane, with Swiss pilot André Borschberg at the controls, landed safely in Hawaii on July 3, completing the longest leg of its around-the-world attempt […]

Dueling press releases arrived in my email inbox at around the same time on Friday morning, one from Airbus claiming the E-Fan demonstrator had made history by becoming the first electric-powered airplane to cross the English Channel and another saying French pilot Hugues Duval had actually pulled off the same feat the night before in […]

Airbus Group’s E-Fan demonstrator was able to successfully cross the English Channel on Friday morning, mirroring Louis Blériot’s historical flight nearly 106 years ago. But the record flight is already proving controversial. Taking off from Lydd Airport in southern England, the twin-fan electric airplane completed the flight in 38 minutes, reaching a cruise altitude of […]

The aviation world hasn’t witnessed this type of intrigue in 106 years — at least as far as an English Channel crossing is concerned. Seeking to replicate Louis Blériot’s famous overwater flight in July 1909, two would-be electric-airplane producers, Airbus and Pipistrel, are preparing to make historic Channel crossings this week in battery-powered prototypes. But […]

New drone designs appear to be popping up all over the place. But here’s one we thought is worth checking out. The ARcopter is a newly designed VTOL drone designed by a company called Colugo Systems. Unlike other VTOLs, however, the ARcopter is capable of landing and hovering in windy conditions as its wings are […]

It’s eerie seeing what appears to be a run-of-the mill general aviation airplane starting its engines by itself and taxiing out to the active runway before taking off with nary a human onboard. UAVs are nothing new, of course, and futurologists tell us self-driving cars will be in dealer showrooms before we know it, but […]

A feat that many thought unachievable with today’s technology has been done. Last week, André Borschberg completed the most arduous leg in the planned round-the-world flight of the all-solar-powered Solar Impulse Si2, crossing the Pacific Ocean from Nagoya, Japan to Kalaeloa Airport just west of Honolulu, Hawaii. The marathon flight took nearly 117 hours and […]

Bell Helicopter test pilots flew the new fly-by-wire 525 Relentless turbine twin for the first time yesterday at the company production center in Amarillo, Texas, officially christening the helicopter maker’s biggest and most capable civil model. The pilots evaluated the 525’s hover and low-speed handling capabilities during the test flight, which was made slightly more […]