Aircraft

FAA Administrator Michael Huerta said the goal of a new FAA project is to place no less than a billion gallons of alternative jet fuel into service by 2018. To that end, the agency has established a Center of Excellence (COE) to research potential fuel technologies. Funding will amount to $4 million per year for […]

With the confirmed death toll now standing at eight from Colorado flooding, a large group of Boulder-area parents are breathing easier today. A group of 85 fifth-grade students and their 14 adult chaperons were airlifted from a nature center where they had been stranded on a weekend field trip. Seven helicopters from the Colorado National […]

The announcement this week by Cessna parent Textron that it is pitching a new budget light attack jet to the Pentagon had us scratching our heads. The military hasn’t asked for anything like this, and with defense spending facing sharp cuts we have to ask if an airplane Textron calls the Scorpion stands any chance […]

Bombardier’s CSeries regional jetliner made its long-awaited first flight on Monday in Montreal, kicking off a development program that has been marred by questions about slow sales and rising costs. The cost estimate for the all-composite jet, which will seat as many as 160 passengers, is $3.4 billion, according to Bombardier. The Canadian manufacturer has […]

With an apparent growing need for flight training all around the world, Cessna has secured a big order for the most popular training airplane in history, the 172 Skyhawk. ViraZH, a flight training provider in Moscow, signed a contract for 79 Skyhawks at last week’s Jet Expo Russia, which took place at the Vnukovo-3 Business […]

We received a press release from Lam Aviation concerning a novel type of aileron, which was said to have brought about remarkable performance gains on a Lancair Columbia testbed. Cruising speed increased by 12 to 16 knots, fuel consumption decreased by 20 to 30 percent, and rate of climb increased by 40 to 50 percent. […]

In the driving rain, I taxied the big Gulfstream G650 across the ramp, being careful to keep it at a crawl on the slightly downhill grade. The line guy in optic-green rain gear directed me to nose up to the slab-sided metal hangar, its proud Gulfstream logo just visible through the fast-moving streaks of water […]

Airbus won enviro-bragging rights at last week’s GreenTec award ceremony, claiming Europe’s “most important environment and business award” for its work on fuel cells in commercial aircraft. But all eyes were also focused on the latest model from Volocopter, which was suspended from the ceiling during the presentation. Volocopter’s recently completed two-seat prototype, the VC200, […]

A group named Directional Aviation Capital has purchased Flexjet, the fractional ownership business formerly operated as a division of Bombardier. There is no doubt that the new owners have great faith in the business. As part of the ownership change, the newly formed Flexjet, LLC signed a deal with Bombardier that could add up to […]

Pipistrel has introduced a new LSA, which offers the capability of quickly turning the airplane from a motorglider into a cross-country cruiser. The Sinus Flex is a standard Sinus model, which was designed with a 49-foot 1.5-inch wingspan. But the outermost parts of the Flex version’s wings are removable and can be substituted for shorter […]