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The USS Gerald R. Ford, a huge new aircraft carrier, reached a milestone in its pricey and extensive construction Thursday when its final keel section was lowered into place at Newport News Shipbuilding in Virginia. The 680-metric-ton lower bow unit is one of the largest of the 500 modules that will make up the completed ship and is over 60-feet-tall. The bulbous bow seen in the picture shifts water flow around the hull, reducing drag and thus increasing speed, range, fuel efficiency, and stability. Carriers with bulbous bows have achieve about 12 to 15 percent increased fuel efficiency than vessels...

WWII fighter plane hailed the 'aviation equivalent of Tutankhamun's Tomb' found preserved in the Sahara A Second World War aeroplane that crash landed in the Sahara Desert before the British pilot walked to his death has been found almost perfectly preserved 70 years later. Most of its cockpit instruments are intact and it still had it guns and ammunition before they were seized by the Egyptian military. There are also signs of the makeshift camp the pilot made alongside the fuselage. No human remains have been found but it is thought the pilot may lie within a 20 mile radius...

Hawker Beechcraft has received approval from a federal bankruptcy court to continue paying employees, vendors and suppliers. There are still many questions about the filing and what it means to current and retired workers. Wichita bankruptcy attorney Bill Zimmerman says planes will continue to be built and, for all practical purposes, Hawker Beechcraft will continue operating during its restructuring. "The whole idea is to maintain value by continuing to operate," said Zimmerman. Something catching employees' attention is a statement on the company website that Hawker may have to terminate its pension plan. Zimmerman says it's not a done deal and...

After a decades-long streak of troubled weapon acquisitions, the Air Force is looking to get off on the right foot as it seeks to buy a new intercontinental stealth bomber. The Pentagon’s new budget proposal gives the Air Force the green light to begin designing a new bomber with a target date for starting production in the mid-2020s. The goal is to acquire up to 100 new aircraft at a cost of about $55 billion. But skeptics already are casting doubts on the plan. They consistently point to the B-2 batwing stealth bomber as a cautionary tale. The Pentagon spent...

In the thick of the Cold War, the Soviet Union built an immense vessel to carry their troops across the seas and into Western Europe. Equipped with nuclear warheads and able to blast across the sea at 340 mph, the Lun-class Ekranoplane; part plane, part boat, and part hovercraft — is a Ground Effect Vehicle (GEV). A GEV takes advantage of an aeronautical effect that allows it to lift off with an immense amount of weight, but limits its flight to 16 feet above the waves. Its altitude can never be greater than the length of the wings. Think of...

The United States Air Force is facing questions from Hawker Beechcraft Corp. after a recent GAO decision effectively removed them from the running in a bid to build our next generation of light attack aircraft.... Hawker Beechcraft, which has been excluded by the U.S. Air Force from competing for a contract to supply a new light attack aircraft, is fighting mad and fighting back. The Wichita-based manufacturer of business jets and turboprops filed suit yesterday with the Court of Federal Claims following notification that the Government Accountability Office (GAO) declined to review its protest of the Air Force decision, which...

Raw power!

The X-37B Mystery Spacecraft Just Had Its Nine Month Mission Extended Indefinitely Robert Johnson Dec. 3, 2011, 9:15 AM Image: US Air Force The pilotless X-37B Orbital Vehicle has been silently circling the planet for the past nine months and the Air Force has announced it will continue its classified mission indefinitely. W.J. Hennigan of the Los Angeles Times reports the X-37B resembles a smaller version of the space shuttle and is said to test various new technologies in space. Via CSM: "We initially planned for a nine-month mission, which we are roughly at now, but we will continue to...

The F-35B short takeoff/vertical landing variant completed ship suitability testing aboard the USS WASP (LHD-1) off the coast of Virginia in October 2011. Combined, F-35B test aircraft BF-2 and BF-4 accomplished 72 short takeoffs and 72 vertical landings during the three-week testing period.

Bookings for U.S.-made products designed to last at least three years fell by 0.8% last month, the Commerce Department said. Economists surveyed by MarketWatch had expected a 1.0% decrease. Transportation orders slumped 7.5% to account for virtually the entire decline... ...Excluding transportation, however, orders climbed 1.7% in September. Demand increased for computers, primary metals, fabricated metals, heavy machinery and electrical equipment.

the Pentagon announced Friday that the remains of 10 airmen missing in action from World War II will be buried next week at Arlington National Cemetery with full military honors. The Department of Defense said in a news release that the crew was on a bombing mission over Berlin in April 1944 when their B-24J Liberator aircraft crashed near East Meitze, Germany. There were no survivors. The crash site was located in 2003 and human remains were turned over to U.S. officials. Additional remains, as well as metal ID tags and a class ring, were gathered over the next few...

Nearly half of the federal government’s firefighting air tankers are siting idle at a California airport, grounded by the Obama administration in a contract dispute just weeks before wildfires swept through Texas killing a mother and her child, and destroying 100,000 acres. The massive blazes forced Texas Gov. and Republican presidential hopeful Rick Perry​ to abruptly call off a campaign appearance in South Carolina earlier this week to respond to the crisis, and may force him to cancel his first debate appearance Wednesday night. The U.S. Forest Service terminated the contract with Aero Union five weeks ago to operate...

The aircraft began arriving Thursday afternoon, and more will be flown to shelter today, according to Capt. Joseph Keith, executive officer for the 134th Air Refueling Wing of the Tennessee Air National Guard.

"Both general aviation and commercial aircraft use the public airspace and air traffic control facilities, and the public has a right to information about their activities." Oh, please. We all use public streets and sidewalks, which doesn't mean the police have a right to monitor our movements and let the world know where we go.

China's first aircraft carrier on Wednesday left its shipyard in the country's northeast to start its first sea trial, the state news agency Xinhua said.

DENVER -- A quadriplegic man from Fort Collins was forced off a Frontier Airlines plane because a pilot said it wasn't safe for him to fly. His mother, Kathleen Morris, said there was no problem two days earlier when her son flew Frontier from Denver International Airport to Dallas to attend a family wedding. But Sunday afternoon, when he boarded in Dallas to come home, John Morris and his family said they were humiliated. "When a flight attendant saw John strapped in, they said they would have to clear it with the captain," said Kathleen Morris. She said that her...

BREAKING: Officials are on scene of an aircraft that landed at Reagan National Airport in Washington, DC after a bomb threat was made against the aircraft. Details are still sketchy, however, sources tell BaltimoreJewishLife.com that a K-9 unit has detected a suspicious bag on board the aircraft. The aircraft and area around it has been evacuated. More information on this story will be posted on BaltimoreJewishLife.com when received.

If you're afraid of flying, reading this post may or may not make it worse. On one hand it describes a story about the smell of a burning plane engine, the expressions of encumbered panic and the experience of coming to terms with death. On the other hand, everybody lives! Reuters photographer Beiwharta had just started to fall asleep on a flight with his family from Singapore to Jakarta when two loud bangs jolted him into a frightening reality. Based on Beiwharta's account of what came next, the activity on a crashing plane is just like you might imagine. The...

We‘ve already showed you Northrop Group’s stealth drone, the X-47B (watch here). Now Boeing has entered the fray with its Phantom Ray, a stealth-style drone that just completed its inaugural test flight at Andrew’s Air Force Base. But the Phantom ups the ante: instead of being just an unmanned drone controlled by remote control, it can be controlled by a computer. The LA Times explains: Boeing Co.‘s experimental drone, dubbed Phantom Ray, flew to 7,500 feet and reached speeds of 205 mph in its first flight. The 17-minute flight took place April 27, but Boeing officials did not confirm details...

To fly the military's baddest, most technologically advanced planes, you once had to have what Tom Wolfe called "that righteous stuff" -- the willingness to strap yourself to a jet-fuel laden machine and push it to the very limits of its mechanical capabilities. Nowadays, unmanned systems have taken the human danger out of some combat missions, though human pilots remain at the sticks. But not for long. The Navy's experimental X-47B combat system won't be remotely piloted, but almost completely autonomous. Human involvement won't be of the stick-and-rudder variety, but handled with simple mouse clicks. Speaking to reporters at the...

Electric airplanes are getting more numerous, with the latest making its initial flight in Augsburg, Germany. The Elektra One, developed by Calin Gologan of PC-Aero, was flown by test pilot Jon Karkow. Since that flight, the aircraft has completed an additional three flights for up to 30 minutes. It will next be upgraded with a variable pitch prop and retractable landing gear. Karkow was the project leader and test pilot for the around-the-world Virgin Global Flyer, and more recently served as technical program manager for the Virgin Galactic commercial space program at Scaled Composites in California. The single-seat Elektra One...

In a conference call with reporters, Missouri Senator Claire McCaskill just disclosed that she failed to pay $287,000 in property taxes related to her co-ownership of a private aircraft. This scandal comes quickly on the heels of recent revelations that McCaskill improperly billed taxpayers for use of the same private aircraft, for which McCaskill reimbursed the Treasury $88,000:

Communist Czechoslovakia delivered 181 L-39 Albatros fighter planes to Libya in the 1980s that can still be used by Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi in the current unrest there, daily Lidove Noviny (LN) writes Saturday. Albatros's predecessor L-29 Delfin ("Dolphin") proved an ideal weapon in the struggle against ground targets such as in the conflict in Nigeria in the late 1960s, LN writes. The history may repeat. Delfin helped massacre the rebels in the Nigerian province of Biafra in the late 1960s and then Gaddafi used the Albatrosses to put down a rebellion in Benghazi and other Libyan towns in 1979,...

Libyan forces have been launched fresh offensives again Zawieh, 30 miles from Tripoli, and Misrata, 125 miles to the east. Rebels said some 2,000 troops loyal to the regime had surrounded Zawieh, but that they had succeeded in holding on to the town centres. "An aircraft was shot down this morning while it was firing on the local radio station," a witness, who was identified only as Mohamed, said by telephone from Misrata. "Fighting to control the military airbase started last night and is still going on," he added.

Aircraft, cargo ships and fishing boats are moving towards Libya to evacuate Chinese nationals living in the North African country. Tunisian, Turkish and other workers are fleeing the country as well. Tripoli – China will send a jet, ships and fishing vessels from nearby waters to evacuate some 33,000 Chinese nationals working in violence-torn Libya. The government has set up an emergency unit headed by Vice Premier Zhang Dejiang to coordinate the repatriation of mainlanders, as well as people from Hong Kong, Macau and Taiwan, the Foreign Ministry said in a statement. The State Council (cabinet) “decided to immediately deploy...

The legend of the Alaskan bush pilot is infused with feats accomplished in aircraft that are rarely seen anywhere else. We have all seen the videos of pilots landing on sand bars and in tight tree-lined mountainous areas. Each year at the Valdez Fly-In and Air Show they celebrate the tradition and skill of the bush pilot with the Short Take Off and Landing (STOL) competition.

CHAPEL HILL, N.C. (AP) -- North Carolina and Michigan State are closing in on a deal to play a basketball game on an aircraft carrier next season. Tar Heels coach Roy Williams said on his radio show Monday night that the teams hope to play on Veteran's Day in San Diego on a carrier. Larry Gallo, a senior associate athletic director at UNC, said Tuesday that a contract isn't in place yet. "We feel as though all systems are go, we're just trying to finalize" details, Gallo said. "But until you have a contract, a deal hasn't been consumated."

(CNN) -- A Delta Air Lines flight reporting an engine problem made an emergency landing Thursday at the Colorado Springs, Colorado, airport, officials said. Two passengers suffered minor injuries during the evacuation

The story that made the rounds of the world that a Muslim man was apprehended on an Air Malta plane when he persisted in praying out aloud in the aisle just as the plane was taxying to take off at London’s Heathrow Airport, now has to be revised. It was a Caribbean Christian man, Maria Busuttil who was on the plane with him, told The Times. And the prayer he was chanting was the ‘Our Father’. Yet even yesterday on In-Nazzjon, Brian Grech who had a hand in restraining the man, still insisted the man was an Arab Muslim. Writing...

Anyone from Michigan see the stealth-type aircraft flying southwest of Detroit, Monroe County today?

The Air Force hasn’t been told when to begin work on a new long-range strike aircraft, or even what it should be able to do. The Air Force is hoping there’s a new bomber included in the Fiscal 2012 defense budget planned for release next month. If there is, it will be the centerpiece of a new portfolio of long-range strike weapons systems, which will encompass standoff missiles, older bombers, airborne electronic attack (AEA), carrier-based aircraft, and possibly a quick-reaction missile able to hit any global target within an hour. Deliberations on the long-range strike system have been a subject...

Systems will provide laser warning sensor sets to protect U.S. military aircraft under a $17.7 million contract by Alliant Techsystems. The contract provides components for the AAR-47 Missile Approach Warning System, part of the ongoing U.S. Navy road-map of airborne protection and system improvements for U.S. Navy, Air Force, Army and foreign allied fleets. The laser detection sensors provide critical warning systems for hostile threats. "With more than 16,000 systems delivered to date, this award continues our support to Alliant Techsystems and the Navy team," said David Millspaugh, director of Product Support for Soldier & Vehicle Solutions in Austin, Texas....

(Reuters) - A U.S. aircraft carrier group set off for Korean waters on Wednesday, a day after North Korea rained artillery shells on a South Korean island, in a move likely to enrage Pyongyang and unsettle its ally, China.....

Nothing more yet, just announced by Shep....

It was US Airways flight 808 Or was it? New evidence points to UPS902 One of my commenters below has given me some critical information that has lead me to update my assessment of what flight caused the "mystery missile" contrail. Make no mistake, I stand by my assertion that the event was nothing more than a contrail, however, new, solid data has come in that has me changing my theory that the contrail in question was not caused by US Airways flight 808 (AWE808) but rather my second contender, United Parcel Service flight 902 (UPS902). In fact I believe...

Aviation China to showcase world's aircraft Xinhua, November 9, 2010 The 8th China International Aviation and Aerospace Exhibition, to be launched on Nov. 16 in Zhuhai, China's mainland, will showcase about 70 aircraft of different models from all over the world, the event organizer announced here Tuesday. The exhibition organizer Zhuhai Airshow Co. Ltd. held a press briefing in Hong Kong on Tuesday and introduced the details of the show, which has attracted about 600 exhibitors to join. The show, with a floor space totaling 23,000 square meters, will feature about 70 aircraft, including both commercial and military ones, from...

Intelligent advanced aircraft is one thing, but if the Air Force wants to be in prime warfighting condition, its pilots had better come with advanced weaponry, too. That’s why the Air Force wants neuroweapons that can enhance airmen’s performance, while degrading the mental states of their foes. The Air Force Research Laboratory’s 711th Human Performance Wing just updated a call for proposals that examine “Advances in Bioscience for Airmen Performance,” according to Wired's Danger Room. The initial announcement came out last November, but no one has yet come up with new stimulants that help airmen focus, or models that fuse...

"More than two dozen injured U.S. troops, including six critical-care patients, have been loaded onto the C-17 transport aircraft destined for Andrews Air Force Base, Md. Then everyone aboard gets the bad news: There's a fuel leak, and the aircraft may not be able to fly today." ... "The Air Force has ordered 213 C-17s to date, but further orders depend on a battle between Congress, which has pushed to extend the production line, and Defense Secretary Robert Gates, who wants to halt further purchases."

The French aircraft carrier which is set to play a key role in defending Britain over the next decade has broken down. As President Nicolas Sarkozy prepares to use a London summit this week to announce that RAF jets will fly from the carrier Charles de Gaulle, his naval chiefs have told him that she is no longer seaworthy. ‘She is meant to be heading to Afghanistan but is instead in her home port with a faulty propulsion system,’ said a French Navy source.

Three years ago, a navigator in the rear seat of a British Tornado jet fighter died when he fell out of the aircraft. Details of the accident are only now being made public. At the time, the aircraft had just undergone some updates and was undergoing a flight check. Some of the maintenance work involved the ejection seats. But the work on the rear ejection seat left a small (5 cm/two inch) metal part installed incorrectly. This allowed the ejection seat to come lose when the aircraft was momentarily upside down. Part of the ejection system worked, and the canopy...

Los Angeles drivers aren't the only ones being screwed over by President Obama this Friday afternoon. The president's journey to the USC campus will also be cushioned by a blockade of air traffic within eight miles of LAX and downtown Los Angeles -- and within 10 miles of Burbank Airport -- from 10:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. The Federal Aviation Association told the Wrap that it has placed a Temporary Flight Restriction on all Los Angeles airspace, and that "only law enforcement aircraft and air ambulance aircraft" will be permitted through at certain times. However, LAX spokesperson Albert Rodriguez clarifies...

How are you spending you weekends? Gabriel Nderitu, an I.T. specialist in Kenya, has been spending his building an airplane, from scratch, in his backyard. The only question is: Will it fly? Nderitu's plane should be taking its first test run sometime in the next few days, according to this news story from Kenya Citizen TV. If it's successful, he'll be the first person in Kenya to build an airplane. He spent the last year working on weekends with the help of a few men he employed as welders. It's spent most of that time in the backyard of his...

On Sep 21, 1956 Grumman test pilot Tom Attridge shot himself down in a graphic demonstration of two objects occupying the wrong place at the same time—one being a Grumman F11F-1 Tiger [138260], the other a gaggle of its own bullets.. It happened on the second run of test-firing four 20mm cannon at Mach 1.0 speeds. At 20,000' Attridge entered a shallow dive of 20°, accelerating in afterburner, and at 13,000' pulled the trigger for a four-second burst, then another to empty the belts. During the firing run the F11F continued its descent, and upon arriving at 7,000', the...

Early Saturday morning in a rainy Seattle. 0300 hrs local time. The location: Boeing's historic Plant II - about to be torn down after three quarters of a century producing thousands of the most significant and historic airplanes ever built. In preparation for demolition, three airplanes that have been undergoing Museum of Flight restoration in the factory's assembly bays will have to be moved. Just as in days past, with lights and images reflecting off the wet pavement, the last three airplanes are rolled out. The giant hangar doors are raised, the tugs and towbars are hooked up, and with...

The DEMON uses output from the jets to control airflow over the plane, manipulating lift and drag without using traditional mechanisms to steer. Its developers believe the technology could revolutionize the stealth capabilities of military aircraft by reducing edges and gaps that can be picked up on radar. The technology could also reduce fuel and maintenance costs for commercial airliners. Professor John Fielding, chief engineer and lead for the DEMON demonstrator team from Cranfield University, said: ''To make an aircraft fly and maneuver safely without the use of conventional control surfaces is an achievement in itself. The DEMON was developed...

WASHINGTON — A scientist and his wife were arrested and indicted on charges of trying to help make a nuclear bomb for Venezuela, the Justice Department announced Friday. Pedro Leonardo Mascheroni, 75, a naturalized U.S. citizen from Argentina, and Marjorie Roxby Mascheroni, 67, a U.S. citizen, were indicted on Thursday by a federal grand jury. Both had worked as contractors at the Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico, the Justice Department said in a statement. If convicted of all 22 charges in the indictment, the defendants face a potential sentence of life in prison, the department said. The U.S....

  154 lives were lost when Spanair Flight 5022 crashed moments after taking off from Madrid-Barajas International Airport in 2008. Now documents from an investigation into the incident are showing that a malware infection may have been to blame.According to the investigation, the computer system used to monitor technical problems on the plane was infected with a trojan. As a result, there were no alerts or warnings for three technical issues which "if detected, may have prevented the plane from taking off."The investigation is still not complete and authorities are trying to determine just how the malware got onto the...

Aviation has rebounded from the economic crisis and the proof is in the US$ 47bn of orders signed at last week's biannual Farnborough International Airshow. While the 2008 Farnborough air show held before the start of the global economic recession saw a total of $89 billion worth of deals signed, aviation and aerospace executives were pleased with the resounding rebound. Of the total sales at the 2010 show over 20% - about US$ 10bn were inked by Russian companies and the biggest smiles were around the Sukhoi stand as its Civil Aircraft division proved the international appeal of the Sukhoi...