E-4B Nightwatch: Inside America’s Doomsday Plane
Share this story Every so often, a white Boeing 747 with a hump on its back turns up at a regional airport, flies a few approaches and leaves. Local TV stations ask what it was. Most recently, News On 6 asked that question in Tulsa at the end of September. The answer...
Visual Identification: Why Fighter Pilots Needed Eyes on the Target
Share this story Modern fighters carry missiles that can hit a target they will never see. Radar finds it, a data link tracks it, and a missile covers the last 50 or 100 kilometres on its own. Yet for most of the jet age, one of the most important rules in air combat...
Austrian Military Pilots to Fly Airbus A320s for Austrian Airlines
Share this story Many air forces share the same problem. It spends years and a small fortune turning a young officer into a military pilot, and then an airline offers that pilot a better salary and a calmer life. Austria has decided to stop fighting the airlines and...
AMCA First Flight Set for 2028: India Names Its Stealth Fighter Deadline
Share this story India has been talking about its own stealth fighter for well over a decade. Now it has a date. Defence Secretary Rajesh Kumar Singh says the first prototype of the Advanced Medium Combat Aircraft (AMCA) is targeted to fly in September 2028. Speaking...
Pope Leo XIV Blesses Rafale Pilots Escorting His Air France A321
Share this story Most passengers get a window seat and a view of the wing. On Monday morning, 28 September, the passenger in the Air France A321 from Lourdes to Metz got the cockpit, a radio microphone, and two Rafales flying about 50 metres off the nose. Pope Leo XIV...
Turkish Pilots Start Eurofighter Typhoon Training at RAF Coningsby
Share this story Turkey will not receive its first Eurofighter Typhoon until 2030. Its first Typhoon pilots, however, are already in Lincolnshire. On 27 September, the Royal Air Force announced that two Turkish Air Force pilots have started conversion training with 29...
Iva MANPADS: Mystery Shoulder-Fired Missile Appears in Russian Service
Share this story Russian state television wanted to show viewers how the army protects the skies over Rostov. It ended up showing the world a weapon nobody can quite identify. In a report aired on the Russia-1 channel, soldiers from a mobile fire group of the 51st Air...
Hürkuş-II Enters Turkish Air Force Service: First Two Trainers Delivered
Share this story On Monday, 28 September, two Hürkuş trainers flew over the Turkish Aerospace (TUSAŞ) plant at Kahramankazan, outside Ankara. On the ground, officials signed them over to the Turkish Air Force. With that, the Hürkuş-II became the first of a new...
USS Eisenhower Mishap: Two Navy Aviators Eject During Carrier Landing
Share this story At about 6:18 p.m. on Monday, 28 September, something went badly wrong on the flight deck of USS Dwight D. Eisenhower. A jet was coming aboard during recovery operations off the coast of Virginia. Moments later, both of its aviators had ejected....
Inside the Geran-4: RFE/RL Tears Down Russia’s Jet Shahed
Share this story Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty has taken a Russian Geran-4 apart on camera, and what spills out of the airframe is less a Russian weapon than a catalogue of global supply chains. The jet-powered successor to the Shahed carries around 55 foreign-made...
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