Hungarian Gripen Crash at Szolnok: Pilot Steered Clear, Then Ejected
The jet was already lost. The 51-year-old major flying it had seconds to decide where it would come down, and below him lay the outskirts of Szolnok, a Hungarian city of roughly 70,000 people. He did not pull the handle. Instead he stayed with the aircraft and steered...
Italy Buys 5,031 APKWS II Rockets as Counter-Drone Weapons
In June 2025, an Italian Air Force spokesperson told Janes that Italy was not looking at acquiring any mission-specific systems to counter drones. On 21 August 2026, the US State Department approved the sale to Italy of 5,031 laser guidance kits designed to turn cheap...
Turkey’s Anka III Drone Will Carry Super Simsek Strike Drones
In February we covered Turkey pairing its KAAN fighter with two ANKA III stealth drones, in Turkey Pairs the KAAN With Two Robot Wingmen. A crewed fighter commanding uncrewed ones is now a familiar idea. On 14 August, Turkish Aerospace posted flight imagery of...
Breguet Atlantic: Europe’s Purpose-Built Submarine Hunter
Almost every maritime patrol aircraft in history has been something else first. The P-3 Orion was an airliner. The Nimrod was the Comet. The P-8 is a 737. You take a tube with wings and long legs, and you fill it with sonar equipment. The Breguet Atlantic is the...
Poland Opens Europe’s Biggest Apache Service Centre
Poland has ordered 96 AH-64E Apache Guardians. When they arrive it will be the second-largest Apache fleet on earth, behind only the United States Army. Ninety-six attack helicopters is a headline. What happened at a factory in Łódź on 11 August 2026...
Dutch MQ-9A Reaper Flies Armed for the First Time
The Netherlands bought the MQ-9 Reaper in 2011 as a pair of eyes. No weapons, no requirement for them, no intention of adding any. For fifteen years that held. On Thursday 20 August 2026, a Royal Netherlands Air Force MQ-9A took off from Leeuwarden carrying weapons...
Norway Swaps Rescue Helicopters for 21 UH-60M Black Hawks
In July 2025 the United States approved the sale of nine HH-60W Jolly Green II combat rescue helicopters to Norway. It was a specialised, expensive, superbly capable machine built for one demanding job: going into hostile territory to bring downed aircrew home. Norway...
Ukraine Wants Its Gripens and Rafales Built at Home
Ukraine is not only buying Western fighters — it wants to build them. The contracts Kyiv has signed for Gripen and Rafale jets include provisions to localise their production and maintenance inside Ukraine, the country’s Air Force aviation commander has...
Macchi M.C.72: The Fastest Seaplane Ever Built
On a grey October afternoon in 1934, the mountains above Lake Garda heard something they would never hear again. A scarlet machine sat low on the water at Desenzano, twin floats trembling, and then its engine spoke — not a drone but a detonating roar that rolled...
Juan de la Cierva’s Autogiro: The Windmill That Refused to Stall
There is a particular kind of genius that begins not with ambition but with fear. Juan de la Cierva was afraid of the stall — that treacherous moment when a wing, robbed of airspeed, simply stops flying and drops its pilot out of the sky. In 1919 one of his own...
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