Aviation & Airliners

An unmanned plane was launched from aboard the U.S.S. George H.W. Bush Tuesday afternoon over the Atlantic Ocean, making it the first time in history that a drone was launched at sea.

In the wake of the grounding of Boeing 787 Dreamliners, Qatar Airways is considering other purchase options. On Monday, Qatar Airways Chief Executive Akbar Al Baker said that the carrier has had to forego$200 million in lost revenue up until April 2013 due to the grounding of Dreamliner craft and resultant production delays. Boeing 787 Dreamliners were prevented from flying across the globe after a number of problems dogged the craft, including battery failures, fires and concerns over the safety of wing components.

A Swiss-made, solar-powered airplane called Solar Impulsetook off Friday on the first leg of an aerial odyssey across America, beginning what's expected to be the slowest flight from San Francisco to Phoenix with nary a drop of fuel.

Adventurer Bertrand Piccard piloted the craft, which has the wingspan of a jumbo jet but the weight of a typical passenger car, from Moffett Field into the Bay Area's skies at 6:12 a.m. ET (9:12 a.m. ET) and headed south toward Arizona.

ST. LOUIS (AP) — A solar-powered plane making its initial cross-country voyage sometime in May will be stopping in St. Louis, Lambert Airport officials said Tuesday.

The exact date of takeoff for the Solar Impulse will depend on the weather: The plane is so light and delicate it can't fly through clouds or bad weather.

Plans call for the Solar Impulse to take off from San Francisco and fly to John F. Kennedy Airport in New York. It will make four stops in between — Phoenix, Dallas, St. Louis and Washington, D.C. The stops other than St. Louis had been previously announced.

L'avionneur américain s'est payé une pleine page de publicité dans les principaux quotidiens nippons mardi pour tenter de rassurer sur la sécurité de son 787, qui doit bientôt revoler au Japon.

US Naval Research Laboratory (NRL) researchers have demonstrated endurance capabilities of the Ion Tiger unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV), powered by liquid hydrogen (LH2) fuel cells, as part of a research programme.

During the test flight, researchers flew the UAV for 48 hours and one minute, far beyond the previous endurance record of 26 hours and two minutes set in 2009, using liquid hydrogen fuel in a new NRL-developed cryogenic fuel storage tank and delivery system.

British Airways has confirmed that LA will be the launch destination for its first A380 aircraft from this October.

Back in July last year forum poster LHRTraveller speculated that the carrier would launch its superjumbo on flights to LA followed by Hong Kong, and this has now been confirmed by the carrier.

The superjumbo will be rostered onto the Heathrow-Los Angeles route from October 15, with tickets on sale from today.

The designs painted on planes help distinguish one airline from another, using colors that promote and represent the brands.

But with frequent mergers and acquisitions in the industry over recent years, traffic in and out of paint shops has increased to keep planes updated with new airline identities.

The latest to emerge from a respray, covering the remnants of bankruptcy, is American Airlines.

The first solar airplane in aviation history to fly day and night without fuel made a stop at the Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport for a week in its quest to fly across the U.S.

Gov. Jan Brewer visited the plane and the pilots Monday night, and said solar is “near and dear” to Arizona.

Dramatic video playing over and over on TV and the internet of a cargo 747 aircraft falling out of the sky shortly after take- off at Bagram Air Base has left some nervous fliers even more nervous that this could happen on a passenger airline.  I have gotten quite a few calls asking how likely this is to happen.   While a probable cause for the accident will not be known for months or longer, investigators will certainly be looking at what caused the aircraft to apparently stall and plummet to the ground, killing all seven on board.  

This is it! The long awaited kickoff of the 2013 Across America mission is about to happen! It seems like the weather conditions are on our side for an early morning departure at 6 am PDT (UTC-7) tomorrow morning, Friday May 3rd from Moffett Airfield and a landing at Sky Harbor International Airport in Phoenix (AZ) sometime after midnight PDT (UTC-7).

Piloted by Bertrand Piccard, HB-SIA will fly southbound, west of Yosemite National Park, to Fresno and Bakersfield. It will then shift slightly west toward Lancaster and then Barstow. From there, Bertrand will get a chance to enjoy a similar landscape to what André experienced last year on his flight to Ouarzazate (Morocco) as he will fly over the Mojave Desert on his way to Phoenix.

Final itinerary revealed!

Solar Impulse’s 2013 Across America itinerary is now official!

Moffett Airfield (Mountain View, CA)Sky Harbor International Airport (Phoenix, AZ) Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport (Dallas, TX) Lambert-St. Louis International Airport (St. Louis, MO)Dulles International Airport (Washington D.C.) John F. Kennedy International Airport (New York City)