Navy’s $10 Billion Trainer Race Begins

Navy’s $10 Billion Trainer Race Begins

Share this story Quick Facts Program: Undergraduate Jet Training System (UJTS) Replacing: Boeing T-45C Goshawk (in service since 1991) Aircraft needed: 216 new jet trainers EMD cost cap: ~$1.8 billion Contract award: March 2027 Competitors: Boeing T-7B, Lockheed/KAI...
America’s Last Triple Ace Comes Home

America’s Last Triple Ace Comes Home

Share this story Quick Facts Who: Col. Clarence E. “Bud” Anderson (1922–2024) Record: 16¼ aerial victories — triple ace, 357th Fighter Group Aircraft: P-51 Mustang “Old Crow” Missions: 116 combat missions, never hit by enemy fire Ceremony:...
Spain Bans American Warplanes from Its Skies

Spain Bans American Warplanes from Its Skies

Share this story Fifteen U.S. military aircraft lifted off from southern Spain on Sunday and scattered across Europe. Nine KC-135 Stratotanker aerial refueling planes flew north to Ramstein Air Base in Germany. Two flights headed for southern France. Four more simply...
Five Companies Fight for Navy’s Next Trainer

Five Companies Fight for Navy’s Next Trainer

Share this story The T-45 Goshawk has been teaching Navy and Marine Corps pilots how to fly jets since 1991. Now, after more than three decades of carrier touch-and-goes, hard landings, and thousands of freshly winged aviators, the little British-designed trainer is...
Factory Rooftops Fight Back: Ukraine’s Private Air Defence

Factory Rooftops Fight Back: Ukraine’s Private Air Defence

Share this story In Kharkiv, a factory that makes industrial equipment now also shoots down Russian drones. On March 30, Defense Minister Mykhailo Fedorov announced that a company called Carmine Sky had successfully downed Shahed and Zala drones using Sky Sentinel —...
Mining Iran’s Missile Cities from the Air

Mining Iran’s Missile Cities from the Air

Share this story A nighttime photograph released by the Israeli Air Force on March 29 shows a pair of F-16I Sufas taxiing for another strike mission against Iran. The jets are loaded heavy. But the weapons hanging under their wings aren’t the precision-guided...
Dozens of Warthogs Gear Up for Iran

Dozens of Warthogs Gear Up for Iran

Share this story Flight trackers lit up over the weekend as a formation of A-10C Thunderbolt IIs — callsign TABOR 71 — crossed the Atlantic toward RAF Lakenheath in England. Behind them, three KC-135 Stratotankers from RAF Mildenhall held station, feeding fuel to the...
Soviet Night Witches: They Flew Without Parachutes

Soviet Night Witches: They Flew Without Parachutes

Share this story The engine dies. The plywood biplane goes silent, gliding through the black Ukrainian sky at 1,200 metres. Below, German searchlights sweep the darkness. Flak crews wait, listening. They hear nothing — just a faint whisper of wind through wire struts....