Dassault Mirage IIIV: The Nine-Engine VTOL Fighter That Hit Mach 2
Share this story In September 1966 a French prototype that could take off vertically flew at Mach 2.04 in level flight. Nothing that could hover had ever gone that fast. To manage it, the Dassault Mirage IIIV carried nine jet engines: one large turbofan for forward...
EWR VJ 101: The First VTOL Fighter to Break the Sound Barrier
Share this story On 29 July 1964, a silver test aircraft from southern Germany went faster than sound. That alone was nothing new in 1964; the Bell X-1 had done it 17 years earlier. What made the EWR VJ 101 C special was that it could also take off straight up, hover,...
Hollywood Burbank Airport Opens Its $1.3 Billion Terminal
Share this story At 07:00 on Tuesday, 13 October 2026, the first flight left Hollywood Burbank Airport’s brand-new passenger terminal. The $1.3 billion building, on the opposite side of the airfield from the old one, replaces a complex whose original buildings...
X-62 VISTA: AI Test Jet Draws 30 Proposals Where 3 Were Expected
Share this story The US Air Force asked for three ideas and got more than thirty. When the Air Force Test Pilot School invited researchers to propose flight tests for the X-62 VISTA in fiscal years 2027 and 2028, it hoped for three test concepts. It received more than...
IRIS-T SLM: German Air Force Fires It Live for the First Time on Crete
Share this story Two years after it received its first IRIS-T SLM fire unit, the German Air Force has finally fired the system for real. In mid-October 2026, soldiers of Air Defence Missile Group 61 from Todendorf launched a live IRIS-T SLM missile at the NATO Missile...
FAA Grounds the Elixir Trainer After a Fatal Flap Failure in France
Share this story The FAA has grounded the Elixir, the French two-seat trainer that only won its US type certificate last year. An emergency airworthiness directive published in the Federal Register on 13 October 2026, effective the next day, bars every Elixir in the...
Massed Modular Aircraft: USAF’s Reaper Successor to Fly by 2028
Share this story The US Air Force’s cheap, autonomous successor to the MQ-9 Reaper is supposed to be flying in operational form within two years. Speaking on a panel at the AUSA conference in Washington on 14 October 2026, Air Force Secretary Troy Meink said...
Piper Malibu Mirage Crash Near Wisconsin Dells Kills Six
Share this story Six people, five adults and a child, died on Tuesday night, 13 October 2026, when a Piper PA-46-350P Malibu Mirage crashed in the Town of Dellona, west of Wisconsin Dells. The Sauk County Sheriff’s Office said everyone aboard the six-seat...
Israel Signs for 12 AH-64E Apache Helicopters After a Budget Scare
Share this story Six days after it missed Washington’s final deadline, Israel has signed for new attack helicopters after all. On 14 October 2026 the Israeli Ministry of Defense said it had signed an agreement with the US Department of War to buy 12 Boeing...
Frankfurt Airport Jet Fuel Shortage: Lufthansa Orders Tankering
Share this story Germany’s busiest airport is running short of the one thing every departure needs. Lufthansa has told its crews to bring extra jet fuel into Frankfurt, because supplies at the airport are tight. The measure, first reported by the German tabloid...
Recent Comments