Pakistan Bets on China’s Stealth Fighter
Pakistan is on course to fly something no air force outside China has ever operated: a Chinese stealth fighter. The Pakistan Air Force has moved to acquire the Shenyang J-35 — reportedly up to 40 jets — in what would be the first export sale of a Chinese...
The Navy’s New Doomsday Plane Is Late
There is one aircraft the United States hopes it never has to use for its real job: the plane that would relay the order to launch nuclear missiles from America’s submerged submarines. Its replacement is now running late — and the government watchdog that warned about...
What Buzzed a Private Jet Over New York?
Ten minutes after lifting off from New York on Independence Day, climbing through 15,800 feet, the crew of a NetJets business jet saw something big and silver flash past their windscreen — close enough to report it. Then it was gone. They keyed the radio and told air...
American Puts Chicago Back on the Tokyo Map
Seven years after American Airlines walked away from the route, Chicago and Tokyo are about to be joined by a nonstop again — and this time American is flying it with its own metal. Starting 27 March 2027, American will run a daily Boeing 787-9 between Chicago O’Hare...
A Gulf First: Qatar Airways Reaches Caracas
On 22 July, a Qatar Airways Boeing 777-200LR will do something no Gulf airline has ever done: land in Venezuela. The flight is QR783, and it does not fly a straight line. It threads Doha to Bogotá to Caracas and back — a single sprawling triangle stitched across more...
Why Airliners Don’t Fly Over Tibet
Pull up a live flight tracker and look at the airways between Europe and East Asia. Hundreds of yellow aircraft icons stream across Siberia, Central Asia, India. And in the middle of it all sits a hole the size of Western Europe with almost nothing in it. That hole is...
Thud Ridge: The Bloody Road to Hanoi
Northwest of Hanoi runs a long spine of mountains called the Tam Dao range. The men who flew the Republic F-105 Thunderchief against North Vietnam never called it that. They named it after their airplane — and after what happened to so many of them beside it. They...
A Robot Tanker Sails Into New York
Among the tall ships and grey hulls that filled New York Harbor for America’s 250th birthday, the strangest silhouette wasn’t a ship at all. Lashed to the flight deck of USS Nimitz, between rows of Super Hornets, sat a windowless grey machine with folded wings and no...
The Stealth Bomber That Stayed Home
On July 4, virtually everything in the US military that flies made an appearance over Washington. Three bombers in one formation. Eight Thunderbirds. A brand-new Air Force One with a Raptor escort. The one aircraft everybody on the internet was actually waiting for...
The Day the Air Force Bombed Los Angeles — and Missed
On the afternoon of August 16, 1956, residents of the Los Angeles suburbs looked up to a strange and frankly alarming sight: two jet fighters chasing a lone, pilotless aircraft in tightening circles, hurling rockets at it — and missing, again and again, while the...
Recent Comments