Aircraft

Cessna is launching its third annual Cessna Discover Flying Challenge. But this year is quite different from previous years. Instead of flying Skycatchers, the two-seat airplanes that Cessna took out of production in the past few months, the selected pilot interns will jump into six Cessna 172 Skyhawks. “The enthusiasm of our interns is contagious […]

Rotax had a big celebration last week at its factory in Gunskirchen, Austria, as the company marked the 25th anniversary of the Rotax 912 and delivered its 50,000th aircraft engine. The celebration was held at Rotax’s second annual fly-in with about 160 people in attendance from 25 countries and four continents. More than 70 light […]

Embraer Executive Jets continues to celebrate the successful introduction of its Phenom family of light jets, the Phenom 100 and 300. The Brazilian manufacturer announced this week that it has delivered the 500th Phenom. The airplane, a Phenom 300, was delivered to Prime Fraction Club, a Brazilian fractional ownership provider based in Sao Paulo that […]

When French company Socata launched the single-engine turboprop TBM 700 with Mooney in 1989, many observers wondered if the airplane would ever be anything more than an aerial oddity. That’s before people began to operate it and realized the many benefits of having a single Pratt & Whitney PT6 up front. That first TBM was […]

Want the very best combination of speed, range, and load-carrying capacity? A single-engine turboprop like those in the TBM series makes a great choice. Here’s a brief look at how the TBM 900 stacks up against its competitors in the turboprop and owner-flown jet market. [Historical data and pricing have been preserved for the record.] […]

The Solar Impulse 2, a massive Swiss-made solar-powered airplane aiming to be the first to fly around the world next year, successfully completed its first test flight yesterday, climbing to nearly 6,000 feet and staying aloft for 2 hours and 17 minutes. The Solar Impulse 2 is a larger version of its predecessor, the original […]

Bombardier is beginning the process of trying to determine what caused an uncontained engine failure during ground maintenance testing of CSeries Flight Test Vehicle 1 in Mirabel, Quebec, on May 29 that has halted the certification program for the narrow-body jetliner. One of the test airplane’s Pratt & Whitney PW1000G geared turbofan engines failed during […]

Two months after announcing the Citation CJ3+, Cessna yesterday celebrated the rollout of the first test airplane at its headquarters in Wichita, Kansas. The newest Citation twinjet, launched on March 20, is expected to receive FAA certification in the second half of the year, Cessna says. The CJ3+ will feature an upgraded Garmin G3000 flight […]

After shutting down the D-Jet program and laying off most of its employees in Canada early last year, Diamond Aircraft’s North American division has been making a quiet comeback. That resurgence was in full evidence with the news yesterday that Diamond Industries Canada and Northrop Grumman are forming a long-term partnership to develop and produce […]

What good does an SLSA certificate do for a company in the light sport market? Well, in the case of California manufacturer Quicksilver Aircraft, the answer is “a lot” and quickly too. Quicksilver yesterday announced the sale of 77 of its recently certificated S2SE model, an open air ultralight style airplane constructed with aluminum tubing […]