EC-130H Compass Call: The Last Hercules Jammer Retires
Share this story At about seven in the morning on 2 September, a grey four-engined Hercules bristling with antennas rolled down the runway at Davis-Monthan Air Force Base in Arizona and climbed into the desert haze. Its callsign was VOLT01. Six hours later it came...
Anduril and the Fury: The Start-Ups Taking On the Defence Primes
Share this story A short clip posted to Instagram this week shows something that would have been unthinkable a decade ago: a jet-powered combat aircraft, no cockpit, no pilot, settling onto a desert runway on its own. The aircraft is Anduril’s YFQ-44A Fury. The...
Frank Kendall Calls Hegseth’s Pentagon ‘Dysfunctional’
Share this story Frank Kendall, who served as US Secretary of the Air Force from July 2021 to January 2025, spent three days at the start of September 2026 making the same argument in three places: an opinion piece in The New York Times on 1 September, an interview on...
Khagantak-243: India Tests a Private-Sector Glide Bomb
Share this story On 2 September 2026 the Indian Air Force released two photographs on X: a bomb in mid-glide, and the detonation that ended its flight. The accompanying text announced the successful drop of an indigenously designed long-range glide bomb called the...
Nikolai Varpakhovich: Russian Bomber General Shot Near Engels
Share this story At around seven in the morning on Thursday 3 September 2026, in the village of Probuzhdeniye on the edge of Engels in Russia’s Saratov region, a man on a motorcycle with his face hidden by a helmet fired two pistol shots at a serviceman, then...
China’s YY-20 Tankers: The Real Measure of the PLA’s Reach
Share this story On or around 31 August 2026, over an Egyptian air base, a Chinese tanker extended its hose and refuelled a French-built Rafale. The Egyptian military spokesman released the image; Chinese accounts amplified it within hours. It is, as far as anyone can...
Poland Intercepts Russian Il-20 Again: Transponder Off Near Ustka
Share this story For the second time in four days, Polish fighters have been scrambled to meet a Russian Il-20 reconnaissance aircraft over the Baltic Sea. On Thursday afternoon, 3 September 2026, the four-engined turboprop was intercepted roughly 40 kilometres north...
The Best Fighter Jet in the World? It Is Not That Simple
Share this story It is the question we get asked more than any other, and it is the one question about fighter aircraft that has no honest single answer. The problem is not that nobody knows. The problem is that “best” is four or five different questions...
Short SC.7 Skyvan: The Flying Shoebox That Refuses to Retire
Share this story Most aeroplanes are shaped by aerodynamics. The Short Skyvan was shaped by what would fit inside it. Short Brothers started from the cargo and worked outwards: a square-section fuselage of constant cross-section, running straight back to a full-width...
GAL Hamilcar: The Glider That Carried a Tank Into Battle
Share this story Inside the glider, in the dark, the tank crew sat in their tank with the engine running. The exhaust was ducted out through the side of the aircraft. When the glider stopped moving, the driver pulled a lanyard to release the shackles and drove...
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