America Lost a Hydrogen Bomb Off Georgia
Share this story Somewhere under the muddy shallows of Wassaw Sound, off the coast of Georgia, sits a 7,600-pound hydrogen bomb. The United States Air Force dropped it there in 1958, searched for ten weeks, gave up, and has left it alone ever since. It is one of a...
A Second B-52 Takes Over the Troubled Radar Test
Share this story Six weeks ago, a B-52 Stratofortress carrying the U.S. Air Force’s brand-new radar rolled down the runway at Edwards Air Force Base, lifted off, and crashed. All eight crew were killed. The single jet fitted with the upgrade the entire bomber...
A Bill Named BRRRRT Wants to Save the A-10
Share this story It is named after a sound. The BRRRRT Act — yes, really — is Congress’s latest attempt to keep the A-10 Thunderbolt II flying, and it wants more of the jets in the air than the Air Force is willing to keep. Rep. Abe Hamadeh (R-Ariz.)...
Russia Loses a Su-57 Near Moscow
Share this story A Russian fifth-generation fighter came down west of Moscow on 23 July. The pilot ejected and survived; the aircraft did not. Russian media identified the jet as a Sukhoi Su-57, the country’s newest stealth fighter. The Defence Ministry confirmed that...
Embraer Wants to Fire Cruise Missiles Off a Cargo Ramp
Share this story Here is a cheap way to terrify a naval planner: take an ordinary cargo plane, roll a pallet of cruise missiles out the back, and let them fly themselves to the target. The US Air Force has been perfecting that trick for years under the name Rapid...
Six Flags, One Submarine Hunter
Share this story Hunting a submarine is a team sport. This year, at the world’s largest naval exercise, the team stopped stopping at national borders — and started sharing the same aircraft.For the first time at RIMPAC, the U.S. Navy is flying mixed...
Manila’s Mach-1.5 Guard Dog Gets Sharper Teeth
Share this story The Philippines is doubling down on the little jet that guards its skies — and this time it is buying the version that finally bites back at range.The Philippine Air Force has confirmed that its next 12 FA-50 fighters remain on schedule, with...
Ten Nights of Fire Over Iran
Share this story Ten nights in, the pattern has become grimly familiar. Shortly after 9:00 p.m. Eastern on 20 July, U.S. Central Command announced it had finished another round of strikes on Iran — the tenth consecutive night — hitting military command...
Lockheed Just Halved the Price of a Patriot Shot
Share this story Modern air defense has a money problem, and everybody knows it. A single Patriot shot can cost more than the drone it swats down, and in a war where the incoming threats are cheap and endless, the math eventually breaks the defender, not the attacker....
America Built a Cruise Missile in 1918
Share this story At 5:55 on the evening of Friday 4 October 1918, a small biplane with cardboard wings and a papier-mâché body lifted off a wheeled dolly running down a portable track near Dayton, Ohio. There was nobody aboard and nobody controlling it. It was...
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