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aircraft
World's Largest RC Chopper Is Probably Big Enough for a Very Short Pilot
This RC helicopter is a scale model of a Russian Mi-24 chopper, a monstrous beast that's 55 feet long. The scale version looks about 1/8th the size, and still scares the crap out of us. Check out the video below. More » -
diy
Man Builds 747 Flight Simulator in His Warehouse, Earns Guinness Record
Flight enthusiast Matthew Sheil has built a 747-400 flight simulator in his Sydney warehouse that can stand up to any $40 million training version—and he did it for under $200,000. More » -
airplanes
Photos of Plane Being Lifted From the Hudson Are Staggering
We've seen plenty of photos of the plane that landed in the Hudson, but none quite like these, which were taken by the crane operator who lifted the downed craft from the chilly waters. More » -
aircraft
Insane Unmanned 'Mule' Drone Can Fly at 289MPH
This Mule unmanned aerial vehicle is huge, fast and crazy. It's just going through its first wind tunnel testing, but it might someday be hauling injured troops back to base with no pilot involved. More » -
military
Britain Building Next-Generation Aircraft Carriers for F-35 Fighters
Britain is not only getting a whole lotta lot of F-35B STOVL fighters, but two new 60,000-ton state-of-the-art aircraft carriers. Apparently, according to Dr Lee Willett, it's all part of a new World arms race: -
jet engines
12 Jet Engine Test Videos Will Have You Yelling "More Power!"
Good ol' Frank Whittle: he dreamed up a device that can both deafen and thrill you at the same time. And you don't even have to be an aircraft fanatic to enjoy these jet engine test videos put together by OObject...the engineering, the noise and general "but what if it blows up?" bonkersness of running a chained-down jet engine to maximum power while it's inside a test shed will get you. Best watched from the comfort of your net surfin' armchair. Wait... what am I saying? That's clearly not true, but if you're unable to get close to a jet test site, you'll just have to make do. [OObject] -
Military secrets
Declassified UFO Files Reveal Military Engagement, Near-Collision
The UK Ministry of Defense has just declassified nineteen secret files detailing UFO encounters over the past decades, one of them involving a USAF Sabre fighter pilot who was ordered to fire at will against an unidentified flying object in British airspace. Unfortunately—or fortunately—lieutenant Milton Torres lost the contact after the UFO left the scene at a whooping 9,941 miles per hour. According to him, it had the proportions of an aircraft carrier: More » -
marine one
First Production VH71, Future Presidential Helicopter, Takes to the Air in England
That plain old yellowish-green helicopter is the really the first production version of the VH71... the future Presidential Marine One. It's been a year since the prototype took flight, but apparently PP-1 (the first of five in phase one) performed "exceptionally during its 40-minute flight." More » -
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Eclipse 400
Eclipse 400 Personal Airplane Is True Sports Skycar
The Eclipse 400 looks is one of those airplanes that you can only imagine in movies or comicbooks. But this is not the Avenger's Quinjet, it is very real, as the video shows. Right now it's being perfected and will be delivered to Tony Starks wannabes in just three years. Its four-seat interior looks more like an expensive sports car than a plane, and it has me saying "want": More » -
super slo-mo
10 Ejection Seat Tests in Sloooowww Moooootion
From lighting strikes, to Mentos explosions, the bottom line is that everything is cooler in slow motion. In this case OObject has collected 10 ejection seat tests that are enjoyable to watch at any speed—but in slo-mo it's like watching a nerdy ballet of planes, fire and rockets. [OObject] -
uavs
Stanford's UAV Helicopters Learn to Fly Themselves by Watching
They may not look as mean as the Draganfly, but these research UAV 'copters are one step closer to Skynet: they learn to fly complex stunts by just "watching" another aircraft do the same. Dubbed "apprenticeship learning," by the Stanford team which developed it, the system gets its flight plan by recording an expert human operator fly a vehicle. Then its onboard gyros and GPS systems and avionics communicate with a ground-based computer which looks at the human-derived data and decides how to fly the vehicle. It's all very tricky, due to the inherent instability of helicopter. Apparently UAVs like this may one day help firefighters track wildfires, or be sent to see out landmines in battlefield situations... and do other "spying" of course. Creepy. [Physorg] -
waterproof coating for aircraft
Researchers Invent Nanotech Waterproofing for Planes
The Air Force's Office of Scientific Research has funded a study that's found a novel waterproofing technique that could prevent ice formation and corrosion from damaging parts of an aircraft, like optical sensors. The transparent coating has a nanoporous surface that is superhydrophobic, which makes water droplets form and roll or bounce-off the aircraft's skin rather than collecting, which is how ice formations happen. Better still it can becrafted to send the droplets in particular pathways across the coating, meaning it may also work as a cheap and simple water-collection system for desert environments: this was inspired by the way the Namib Desert beetle gathers moisture. We wonder though... is it as good as Golden Shellback? [AirForceLink] -
whoosh
Bed Made of DC-9 Fins Lets You Join Mile High Club at Sea Level
A chair made of torpedo-launcher parts just wouldn't say "come hither" to techy ladies in the same way as this bed from Motoart. Dubbed Mile High, you can tell it's aimed at the sexier end of the geek furniture market, partly as it's marketed with a "a wonderful playground for you and your co-pilot" slogan, and especially when you notice the line of glowing red LEDs that pimp the frame's lower edge. The 11- by 7.5-foot bed is made of two DC-9 stabilizer fins and a C-130 inner flap. And if there's a particular aviator you want to attract between the sheets, you'll likely have to save up: it's price on application only, which generally means lots of dollars. [MotoArt via TFTS] -
birds eye view
Tailcam Video Shows Awesome Plane's-Eye-View of A380 in Flight
This video is a feed from the Tailcam in an A380 as the aircraft takes-off. The cam feed can be shown on the seat-back displays and gives you an almost Superman-like view of the aircraft from 79-feet up at the top of the tail. It's pretty amazing watching the behemoth aircraft surge slowly down the runway and into the air... and there's another vid, showing it landing in to SFO as part of the recent Emirates tour. More » -
ka-boom
Jet Explodes in Midair, Leaves Us Scratching Our Heads
Even while I knew what was going to happen when I saw this video, it shocked me when I saw it exploding the way it did, with no warning whatsoever. To be honest, I don't know if this Saudi fighter jet is a real fighter jet or not. It sounds like one, it looks like one, and it explodes like one, so it must be an airplane or a duck. But somehow, some people think it may be an RC model. Still, the idea of the plane just exploding like that reminds you how fragile our technological world is—says the guy taking a plane on Monday. What do you people think? Real or model? More » -
showers
Photos Emerge of Emirates A380 Showers: Tiny, But Luxurious
See that happy-looking lady in the pic? She's standing in an Emirates A380 in-flight shower room, details of which have emerged after we first alerted you to this airborne luxury. The "shower spas" are pretty decently kitted-out, and the aircraft carries an extra 1,100-pounds of water to allow every one of the 14 first-class passengers to have a splash. As a result, the shower only runs for five minutes, and there's a traffic-light system to let you know how the time's going. And if you're planning on trying to form a new "mile-high, in the shower" club, you'd better forget it: the showers are small, "designed for single usage." More » -
glider
Orlens Glider Concept is Green, Recyclable Air Transport of the Future
This concept glider, dubbed Orlens, is attention-grabbing through its rather beautiful shape alone. But when you look into how it would work, you can see that designer Roland Cernat has put a lot of thought into its greenness. It would be made of entirely recycled materials, and be recyclable itself, would have photovoltaic cells atop the wings for energy for eco-friendly propulsion and have an aerodynamically-efficient body. The body too would be made from a flax-based bio-compound that would be CO2 neutral. It's pretty much what green personal air-transport of the future should look like, which is why it's just won Roland the Lucky Strike Junior Designer Competition. Impressive, and I'd love to take it up and give it a spin, were it not just a concept. [Inhabitat] -
tiltrotor
Buy Your Own V22, Kinda: Bell 609 Civilian Tiltrotor Gets Rolled-Out
Forget the improbable promises of the Falx tiltrotor: Bell aircraft has rolled out its 609 civilian tiltrotor for real. Looking and flying like a smaller cousin of the military V22 Osprey, also a Bell vehicle, the 609 will undoubtedly please millionaire business people since it can perform all the rooftop-landing duties of a normal helicopter, but flies twice as fast and can fly 9 passengers up to 25,000 feet altitude. Plus, it'd be undeniably cooler to turn up at your meetings in something that looks like it belongs in a sci-fi flick versus something that reminds people of Magnum, PI. More » -
lego
Lego Concorde Can Brick the Speed of Sound
This Lego Concorde may not be as big as the Lego Airbus A380, the biggest Lego airplane in the world, but it's still huge. It's not only pretty, but this huge plane can maintain its structural integrity while being swooshed around by Ed Diment. It also allowed me to easily make bad headline puns, which is always a plus. As you can see in the gallery, its nose and landing gear are fully articulated, like the real one. [Brothers Brick] More » -
boom
Air Force Dismantles Crashed C-130 in Military-Style: With Lots of Explosives
What do you do with a C-130 cargo aircraft that has made a crash-landing in an insecure area of Iraq? If you're the 447th Expeditionary Operations Support Squadron you wire it with explosives and you blow it up. Again and again and again... until it's in small enough bits to load onto a flatbed and ship back to an air base. Apparently it's pretty rare for an aircraft to make emergency landings in the field, which is good news. Though if it resulted in more videos like this, we wouldn't complain. [PointNiner via Danger Room] -
uavs
Armchair UAV Pilots Striking Afghanistan in Las Vegas, Taco Bell Fueled Comfort
We all know about how the military is utilizing UAV's in an ever increasing amount of missions. And why not? Unmanned aircraft represent a safer and more cost efficient approach to aerial combat. However, we rarely get to see what it is like on the other side of these aircraft—to see the job through the eyes of a UAV pilot. Apparently, it's much like any other job—except you get to kill things in Afghanistan from the air-conditioned Creech Air Force Base in Nevada. More » -
aircraft
Boeing JHL-40 Heavy-Lift Rotorcraft Is Massive Floating Crane
This stunning aircraft—that looks straight out of a science-fiction movie in which the Nazis won WWII—is the Boeing SkyHook JHL-40. A heavy-lift rotorcraft designed to lift 40 tons, it can transport its cargo across 200 miles without refueling in adverse environments like the Arctic. According to Boeing, it will be able to reach where no other kind of transport can go, at a fraction of the cost, with less environmental impact, and without danger to the crew. Seeing it carrying massive tree trunks makes the JHL-40 look even more impressive: More » -
Biggest Lego Airplane in the world
Lego Airbus A380 Is Biggest Lego Airplane in the World
Behold the biggest Lego airplane in the world, made after the largest passenger airplane in the world, the Airbus A380. Made at a 1:25 scale-9.5-foot long, 10.5-foot wingspan, 3.2-foot tall—the Lego A380 uses 220 pounds (100kg) of bricks. That's a mindblowing 75,000 pieces in eight colours—15 Lego Millennium Falcons. More » -
boeing 787 dreamliner
Dreamliner First Power-On, All Systems Nominal
After all the problems and delays with in the 787's manufacturing, they have finally powered-on the aircraft and completed all the start up tests. In this picture you can see Boeing's test technician Dave Haskell plugging the aircraft to an external power line. The power-on of all the electrical systems in the aircraft, including the orgy room and the cockpit—which you can see up and running after the jump—is a major milestone towards the completion of the plane and its first flight later this year. More » -
china
Chinese UFO Looks Like Emergency Life Raft, Spies on You
Chinese company Harbin Smart Special Aerocraft has spent 12 years and over $4 million developing its unmanned flying saucers. Somewhat reminiscent of the Honeywell Micro Air Vehicle, the unmanned drone has propellers that run on methanol, a top speed of around 50mph, and can stay at an altitude of around 1,000 yards up for 40 minutes or so. Expect to see it being used for aerial photography, geological surveys and in people's LSD-fueled weird-outs. [DVICE] -
iphone
Berkeley Group Uses iPhone to Control UAV Squadron
The Center for Collaborative Control of Unmanned Vehicles (C3UV—the "3" makes it hip) at the University of California, Berkeley has developed a system that uses the iPhone to develop tasks, set coordinates and send orders to a fleet of UAVs. Naturally, this development is interesting because it allows a single person to control a large number of small, unmanned aircraft at one time using a cellphone. But, as Wired points out, the clause in the SDK agreement clearly states that "autonomous control of vehicles, aircraft, or other mechanical devices" is a big no-no. So the future of this type of technology is unclear.[C3UV via Wired] -
ipod friendly skies
United Airlines Offering iPod/iPhone Connectivity on International Flights
United Airlines may be screwing passengers with hefty ticket prices and bag fees, but if you are an iPod/iPhone user, the friendly skies just got a little friendlier. A new deal makes United the first U.S. carrier to offer iPod and iPhone connectivity to its in-flight entertainment system. More » -
gadgets
DARPA Technology Autonomously Lands Severely Damaged Aircraft
DARPA, the Pentagon's source for R&D (and lovers of acronyms big and small) have released a video illustrating the Damage Tolerance and Autonomous Landing Solution they developed alongside Athena Technologies. Basically, DTALS is designed to take over for a pilot in the event that the aircraft sustains heavy damage. The system automatically detects the damage and adjusts the flight control system to land the aircraft safely. More » -
aircraft
Boeing Working on Real-Life Colonial Marines Dropship
The US Air Force wants a new cargo aircraft, a pressurized airplane capable of carrying 65,000 pounds for 1,500 nautical miles without refueling. They call it the Speed Agile Concept Demonstrator—it's supposed to travel at a minimum Mach .8 at 30,000-feet—but they may as well have called it the UD-4L Dropship, because it looks like the Colonial Marines' Cheyenne in Aliens. Boeing is going to get a mere $7.5M to work on it to get the technology ready for 2010—which doesn't mean having the airplane by then, just the pretty drawings for us to post about. [Defense Tech] -
aircraft
New Secret X-Bomber Is Not So Secret Anymore
Northrop Grumman is working on a new classified bomber prototype for the Air Force, at an estimated cost—according to their financial statements—of $2 billion. Apparently, the first version will require human/clone/Cylon pilots, with a high-endurance unmanned model possibly following after that. According to military industry magazine DTI, there is a high probability that the New Generation Bomber—concept above—will be following the success of the X-47B unmanned bomber aircraft.
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futuremodo
The Future of Aviation Isn't Coming Soon Enough
We have mentioned the increased efficiency and lower emissions of blended wing body aircrafts before—like the X-48B, now in its prototype testing phase. Seeing two of them getting ready to take off, however, pushes the concept from the That's Pretty Cool to the Geezussrollerbladingchrist, We Want These So Badly category. Even if it's just a synthetic image, they look absolutely stunning. [Note: I heard somewhere that the reason why commercial wings didn't fly is that people don't want to fly on things without passenger windows; Trust issues and the like. - B.L.][Flight Global] -
uavs
Israeli Institute Plans Battlefield Medevac UAVs
You may think someone over in Israel's Fisher Institute for Air and Space Strategic Studies had been watching one too many episodes of The Jetsons, but no... this is a real project. It looks like an Israeli consortium, led by the Fisher Institute, is attempting to put together the world's first unpiloted battlefield resupply and evacuation aircraft, dubbed "MedUAV." And as the strangely 1960s sci-fi concept drawing shows, it could take the form of a ducted-fan VTOL air car. More » -
patents
Plasma-Powered Hovercraft Patent
The patent shown is for an aircraft to be powered off the ground using a plasma technology. Subrata Roy, a University of Florida aerospace engineer, proposes the existing technique of passing a magnetic wave through a conducting fluid can produce a force strong enough to lift an aircraft off the ground. Granted, the example in the patent is only 15 cm, and attempts by others haven't gone particularly well. But with phrases like magnetohydrodynamics being thrown around, I keep flashing back to the space travel scene in Contact and getting excited. Subrata Roy must be a poet. [WIPO via Ubergizmo] -
aircraft
Joint Strike Fighter Technology May Have Been Compromised...Whoops!
It appears that the geniuses at the Defense Department have been asleep at the wheel of their new Joint Strike Fighter program, leading some to believe that its super valuable aviation and weapons technology may have been compromised. The crux of the problem involves the fact that the Pentagon's Defense Security Service (DSS) has had a difficult time monitoring the contractors working on the aircraft. While no specific breaches have come to light regarding the classified information, an audit has uncovered that the DSS cut corners and the DoD suffered lapses in its controls designed to evaluate and protect the sensitive information from unauthorized access. More » -
tilt-rotor
Falx Promises Private Tilt-Rotor Aircraft. Verdict: Improbable
This small V-22 Osprey lookalike looks like a sleek and sexy machine, doesn't it? The Falx Salker is a VTOL aircraft and is designed to be a hybrid electric vehicle, with solar energy augmenting the 100hp engine to achieve a fuel efficiency of 10 liters per hour of flight. According to their website, Falx Air Vehicles is "set to release its first 100% scale platform during 2008 leading to certification during the next 3 years." More » -
exclusive
A10 RC Model vs the Real Thing at Top Gun 2008
Here's the 1:5 scale A-10 Warthog remote control model in some video action at Top Gun 2008, in Lakeland, FL.—the biggest remote controlled airplane competition in the world. And to match it, a real A-10 appeared on the scene, taking off from a parallel runway. We interviewed Mike Selby, one of the model creators, and got all the technical details about this amazing $12,000 beast, with two jet turbines, three on-board microprocessors, 24 servos, a 1" OLED display in its cockpit and a fully-functional gatling gun. Jump to see all its amazing details in a 26-photo gallery. [Video and images courtesy of Bob Parrish] More » -
boeing dreamliner
How to Equip Your Dreamliner (Including 23" Displays for First Class Seats)
Probably trying to polish its current poor image, Boeing invited Fortune Magazine to get an inside look into the Dreamliner factory, secret orgy quarters, and the showroom, in which—after spending $150 million on an empty aircraft—you have to pick the seats, including their A/V entertainment equipment (like whopping 23" LCD monitors in first class), and even the coffee maker. Head to Fortune to see the entire video and gallery. [Fortune] -
hidden high mile club
Dreamliner's Secret Crew Quarters Should be Called Orgy Room
Here's one of Boeing Dreamliner's most closely guarded secrets: the Orgy Room. Boeing likes to call it "the Crew Quarters" but, come on, what images does this cozy compartment, hidden in the top of the composite fuselage bring to mind? Here's a hint: it has six tightly packed beds for flight attendants, who use them to "have siestas" when the flights are too long. What. Ever. [Fortune] -
robots
AquaJelly and AirJelly Robot Jellyfish At Home In the Water or the Sky
Festo, the same company that brought us the Air Ray robot last year, has developed yet another graceful robot inspired by a creature of the sea. In fact, they have developed two versions, both based on the common jellyfish: the AquaJelly and the AirJelly. According to Festo, the AquaJelly is "an artificial autonomous jellyfish with an electric drive and an intelligent, adaptive mechanical system." Apparently the idea is to have several of the robots autonomously working together using a communication system composed of Zigbee short-range radio on the surface and LEDs when underwater. More info and videos after the break. More »






































