Aircraft

The Cessna Citation Ten, the under-development version of the Citation X, Cessna’s super-fast midsize business jet, made its first flight from the company’s home field, Wichita Mid-Continent Airport, earlier this week. The jet’s first sortie was an unusually long one for a first test, lasting two hours. This gave flight test pilots time to do […]

The Civil Aviation Safety Authority (CASA) of Australia has issued an airworthiness directive temporarily grounding all Beechcraft Bonanza, Debonair and Baron models after aircraft inspections revealed damaged flight control cables. CASA has ordered the repair of any damaged cables before further flight, and has directed operators to replace any cables in use for more than […]

(January 2012) The news cycle is like a carousel whose riders are ever changing. For a brief moment in September, the Green Flight Challenge swept past: NASA handed a prize of $1.35 million to an airplane that had achieved an efficiency of 400 passenger-miles per gallon. Huh? said the world — and then along came […]

The Mexican Air Force (FAM) has sealed a deal with Hawker Beechcraft for six of the company’s new T-6C+ trainers, Beechcraft announced this week. The new trainers, equipped with Esterline CMC Cockpit 4000 avionics, HUD and an up-front control panel, among other features, will replace the FAM’s existing fleet of Pilatus PC-7s. According to Beechcraft, […]

As Boeing moves ahead with plans to leave Wichita, Learjet revealed it will expand its footprint there. Kansas Gov. Sam Brownback and ** Bombardier** Business Aircraft President Steve Ridolfi on Tuesday announced an expansion of the company’s Learjet production site, saying the growth will create 450 new jobs over the next seven to 10 years. […]

Could it be the first sign of a broader industry turnaround? The blossoming of a single flower signaling the end of long, hard economic winter? It’s hard to say, but the news is encouraging: Robinson Helicopter Co. just reported it more than doubled its production in 2011, building 356 helicopters last year versus 162 in […]

The engineers at Tecnam appear to be frantically pumping out new LSA designs, and now the company is focusing its attention on tailwheel lovers – a group of pilots who are ignored by most manufacturers these days. A tailwheel version of the P92 has been brought to the market on the heels of the P92 […]

Tecnam has just increased the versatility of its popular P92 high-wing LSA series airplanes by introducing an amphibious version, the P92 Sea-Sky Hydroplane. This seaplane model will be offered for both the Echo Classic and its slightly larger and faster sibling, the Eaglet. Flight tests are in progress and the only performance numbers available so […]

A father and daughter from Alabama are continuing their medical mission in Haiti after safely ditching off the coast of Florida near the Bahamas on Saturday when the engine in their Cirrus SR22 suddenly quit. Dr. Richard McGlaughlin, 59, and his daughter, Elaine McGlaughlin, 25, departed from their home near Birmingham, Alabama, on Saturday for […]

_Enola Gay. FIFI. The Great Artiste. Kee Bird. The Big Stink. _ It was an airplane dubbed “Superfortress.” Yet many of the most famous Boeing B-29 bombers that plied the skies during the latter days of World War II carried strangely meek-sounding individual names. Perhaps that’s of benefit to our collective psyche since the airplanes […]