Free Republic

I ran across this while mousing around. Several flights are looping around without landing.

Because "the F35 JPO does not have an independent record of the global spares pool, and the values of the lost spare parts are not the fully burdened cost, the $85 million of identified losses by [the subcontractor] may not accurately represent the full quantity and value of lost spare parts,” the GAO found. WASHINGTON — The government cannot account for more than $85 million in F-35 Joint Strike Fighter spare parts, a number that is likely far smaller than the actual total of untracked components, the Government Accountability Office has found in a new report. But worse than the...

<p>HIROSHIMA, Japan (AP) — President Joe Biden on Friday endorsed plans to train Ukrainian pilots on U.S.-made F-16 fighter jets, according to two people familiar with the matter, as he huddled with allies at the Group of Seven summit on how to bolster support for Kyiv against Russia’s invasion.</p>

A senior Aeroflot flight attendant told the publication that employees were instructed "not to record any breakdowns encountered during flights in the Cabin Log Book (CLB), but rather to verbally communicate the details of the issues and their location," according to a translation by independent Russian media outlet The Insider. A former pilot told Proekt that on a flight in January, he found a fuel leakage while starting the engines of a Boeing 737. When he called technicians to investigate the leak, they said it had been there for a while. "It had happened several times before, but there were...

CHARLOTTE — Passengers on a flight that was about to take off from Charlotte-Douglas International Airport on Thursday got a view that nobody wants to see when they look out the window: flames shooting from the wing. Frankie Leggington shared video of the incident with Channel 9, adding that the plane had to go back to the terminal Thursday evening. “We were taking off like normal when the wheels go up, you feel a little bump,” Leggington said. “Then all of a sudden, you hear an explosion.” The video shows the airplane, an Airbus A321, going down the runway at...

REGENT has revealed the full-scale mockup of its seaglider, an all-electric passenger vehicle with a range of 180 miles. (Photo: REGENT) The company REGENT, which is developing a new kind of electric maritime vehicle called a seaglider, revealed the full-scale mock-up of its seaglider prototype today. REGENT also announced plans to expand its global headquarters for new manufacturing and test facilities. The expansion has the potential to enable fulfillment of $8 billion in commercial orders by 2025 at the headquarters in Rhode Island. Last September, the company announced that its quarter-scale seaglider technology demonstrator completed its first flight. According to...

Phil Washington, Joe Biden’s embattled nominee to head the Federal Administration Aviation, has withdrawn his nomination ... Reuters’ piece .. didn’t refer to Washington’s miserable performance when questioned by Sen. Ted Budd (R-NC) in which he went 0-for-7 on aviation policy. ... Nor did they refer to the exchange between Washington and Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) in which it’s quite possible that Washington committed perjury by claiming that a contract at the center of a pay-to-play criminal investigation in California in which Washington is “materially involved” was already in force before Washington became head of LA Metro. ... While the...

Three of the four victims have been identified, including a flight instructor, a college student and a 67-year-old man. Where the planes departed from and what caused the deadly collision remains unknown... the crash happened around 14:00 EST (19:00 GMT) near the Winter Haven Regional Airport & FBO. After the collision, one of the planes was 21ft (6m) under water while the other was partially submerged. One of the two planes involved was a Cherokee Piper 161. It carried Faith Irene Baker, 24, a flight instructor with Sunrise Aviation, and Zachary Jean Mace, 19, a student at Polk State College....

CNN: US Pilots approaching object shot down over Alaska said the aircraft interfered with their plane’s sensors, another said they ‘could identify no identifiable propulsion system and they did not know how it was actually staying in the air

TOKYO -- Since Russia's invasion of Ukraine nearly a full year ago, attacks against military and civilian targets alike have caused numerous deaths, with no end to the fighting in sight. Intelligence analysts, however, have taken interest in one specific part of the death toll: the number of Russian generals killed in the conflict Generals command hundreds or thousands of soldiers. A larger number of general deaths thus signals a weak military. British media reported in June that over 10 generals had been killed. Japan estimates the total at more than 20, based on intelligence gathered in cooperation with the...

The Chinese Defense Ministry loudly protested America’s decision to shoot down a Chinese alleged espionage aircraft over the waters of South Carolina, claiming that taking action to stop the breach of U.S. airspace after the balloon had crossed the entire continental United States and Alaska was an “obvious overreaction.” The Chinese Defense Ministry suggested it could take reciprocal action against American civilian aircraft, without elaborating. News began rapidly spreading across social media on Friday of a bizarre, round flying object appearing over the skies of Montana, forcing the administration of leftist President Joe Biden, who has a long history of...

There are an unending number of interesting facts about the SR-71 Blackbird, probably the coolest aircraft ever produced by any Air Force, anywhere in the world. It’s the only airframe that’s made of 85% titanium, titanium that was purchased by the CIA from the Soviet Union – the country the aircraft was built to spy on. It’s capable of cruising at more than three times the speed of sound at 85,000 feet – and that speed and altitude are its only defenses. **SNIP** It’s also the only Air Force aircraft ever made with the “SR” designation. The reason for that...

America’s premier long-range heavy bombers are back in Guarm, and they mean business. Air Force B-1B Lancer bombers from the 28th Bomb Wing at Ellsworth Air Force Base in South Dakota arrived at Andersen Air Force Base in Guam on Thursday as part of a mission with the core goal of “deterring potential adversaries and challenging their decision calculus,” the service announced in a press release. The arrival of the undisclosed number of Lancers marks the second rotation to Guam this year following a Bomber Task Force (BTF) mission in June that saw four aircraft integrate with Japan Air Self-Defense...

The USAF wants to retire the F-22 beginning around 2030 mainly due to two reasons: the F-22’s high operating costs, and the F-22’s obsolescence in a number of areas, with the latter being the primary reason. With regards to high operating costs, the F-22 fleet was not produced in sufficient quantities to replace the F-15, and therefore its logistics and supply chain do not benefit from economy of scale as much as jets like the F-16 and F-35. The F-22 also uses legacy stealth materials that increase maintenance costs; properly retrofitting the F-22 with the F-35’s more durable full material...

U.S. Capitol Police (USCP) sent more than a few pulses racing on Wednesday when they evacuated the Capitol Building over a suspicious aircraft that they later cleared as a “no threat.” “The USCP is tracking an aircraft that poses a probable threat to the Capitol Complex,” said the initial announcement that sent Twitter into a fury

We recently warned that Europe is about to be hit with an unprecedented shortage of diesel, as gas stations run dry of the vital liquid (according to the CEOs of the world’s largest independent energy merchants), but little did we know that the first actual crisis would hit in America’s own back yard and not just anywhere but the state synonymous with commodity extraction: on Monday, airport officials in Austin, Texas warned of an impending jet-fuel shortage amid a surge in travel to and from the state’s capital city. Austin-Bergstrom International Airport, which is ranked No. 29 in the U.S....

The authorities of the Republic of Poland, after consultations between the President and the Goverment, are ready to deploy – immediately and free of charge – all their MIG-29 jets to the Ramstein Air Base and place them at the disposal of the Government of the United States of America. At the same time, Poland requests the United States to provide us with used aircraft with corresponding operational capabilities. Poland is ready to immediately establish the conditions of purchase of the planes. The Polish Government also requests other NATO Allies – owners of MIG-29 jets – to act in the...

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on Monday urged countries uncomfortable with his proposal to establish a no-fly zone over his country – effectively requiring foreign countries to shoot down Russian planes – to consider, instead, offering Ukraine more weapons. The suggestion is a dramatic change in tone from Zelensky’s remarks on Saturday, in which he told NATO countries that Ukrainian civilians will “die because of you” and called them “weak” for rejecting the responsibility of implementing a no-fly zone.

A Russian attack helicopter makes a menacing low pass over a rural village in Ukraine, its gunship fully equipped with missiles and machine guns. But, unknown to the crew of the state-of-the-art Mi-24 Hind aircraft, Ukrainian soldiers are waiting unseen in the line of trees below. -snip- Their deaths came on a day when Russian aerial forces lost as many as eight aircraft, as well as multi-role, strike and close air support aircraft and a drone. Their losses, claimed by Ukrainian military sources, provide further evidence of Russia's failure to gain air superiority – a tactical advantage that Vladimir Putin...

Ukraine still has a “significant majority” of its military aircraft available nine days after Russian forces started their invasion of the country, a United States defence official told the Reuters news service on Friday. Vastly outmatched by Russia’s military in terms of numbers and firepower, the fact that Ukraine’s own air force is still flying and its air defenses are still deemed to be viable has surprised military experts. “The Ukrainians still have a significant majority of their air combat power available to them, both fixed-wing and rotary wing as well as unmanned systems and surface-to-air systems,” the official said,...