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[NEW YORK] Qatar Airways on Monday said it plans to expand its services to the United States, in a move that rankled US airlines which accuse it of competing unfairly through state subsidies. The Gulf carrier announced its first direct flights to Los Angeles, Boston and Atlanta from its Doha hub and its second daily flight to New York.

Credit: NASA Langley/David C. Bowman A team at NASA's Langley Research Center is developing a concept of a battery-powered plane that has 10 engines and can take off like a helicopter and fly efficiently like an aircraft. The prototype, called Greased Lightning or GL-10, is currently in the design and testing phase. The initial thought was to develop a 20-foot wingspan (6.1 meters) aircraft powered by hybrid diesel/electric engines, but the team started with smaller versions for testing, built by rapid prototyping. Imagine a battery-powered plane that has 10 engines and can take off like a helicopter and fly...

One of the first Spitfires ever made has gone up for sale for a staggering £2.5 million after spending 40 years buried in sand at the French beach it crashed on. The iconic Mark 1 plane was among the first built in March 1940 as Britain scrambled to ready itself for the epic battle that took place in the skies just a few months later. But Spitfire P9374 never made it to the Battle of Britain as it crash-landed in May 1940. The fighter plane was being piloted by Flight Officer Peter Cazenove over Dunkirk when it was hit by...

Does it make sense to fly a blimp for Ted Cruz?At least one, probably several. Can enough money be raised?No doubt. What else will it take?To do the Ted Cruz Blimp successfully and efficiently we’ll have many teams working together. We put the Ron Paul Blimp teams together in about six weeks in 2007 and, even though we did quite well, we also made a lot of mistakes. Because we have more time now to do better advance planning, we can be even more efficient and more successful with the Ted Cruz Blimp. Teams Before we raise any money or...

It has been 50 years since two Avro Lancaster bombers flew side by side. The Canadian Warplane Heritage Museum's Avro Lancaster, VeRA, flew from Hamilton, Ontario to meet her British counterpart, Thumper—the only other surviving flight worthy Lancaster bomber in the world—the RAF Battle of Britain Memorial Flight's (BBMF) Lancaster in England. Suddenly SeeMore...Productions Inc's specialty is reality adventure television and the people who make it. REUNION OF GIANTS documents this historic mission as it unfolds, through the eyes of the flight crews, veterans, friends and family—all part of the bombers’ history, including this new chapter as VeRA crosses the...

Woman steals $10k worth of mini alcohol bottles • An aeroplane cleaner working at JFK Airport has been arrested for allegedly stealing more than 1,400 miniature bottles of booze worth US$10,000. Juanette Cullum, 48, of Brooklyn, allegedly stole the alcohol over a three-year period from American Airlines planes in Terminal 8, reports the New York Post. Police were alerted to the thefts by an airport security guard, and uncovered 1,429 miniatures bottles hidden in a wardrobe at Cullum’s home. On average, the 50ml bottles have an RRP of US$7 each on flights. But while the loot is estimated to worth...

Rescuers were attempting to help a woman who fell from a cliff in the Barton Creek Greenbelt but were having difficulty finding her so they called in STAR Flight. McLain was part of a flight crew that was using bright lights and night vision when they found the patient. McLain was lowered down to the patient and helped prepare her for transit via helicopter. STAR Flight crews radioed for help indicating something was wrong. Rescue crews on the ground located McLain, who had severe injuries, and attempted to resuscitate her. She was pronounced dead at the scene, ATCEMS chief Ernesto...

Bell Helicopter announced today that it will lay off 1,100 employees. The Fort Worth-based helicopter company has a location on Pont Des Mouton Road in Lafayette, according to the company's website. The company did not release specifics on which locations will see layoffs, but the communications director did say in a news release that the reduction in workforce will apply to all areas of the business, both management and non-management, and covered and non-covered workers. In addition to its Pont Des Mouton location, Bell Helicopter broke ground in August last year on an 82,300-square-foot aircraft assembly center near the Lafayette...

The Air Force will send some perfectly fine fighter jets to the boneyard or delay its F-35 Lightning II rollout for a year if Congress blocks retirement of the A-10 Thunderbolt, according to a document recently provided to military oversight committees. The tradeoffs would occur at Hill Air Force Base in Utah, due to limited number of personnel to maintain the A-10s, F-16 Fighting Falcons and the first advanced F-35 joint strike fighters slated to arrive later this year, the service told lawmakers. The Air Force and Congress have been grappling over the future of the A-10, known as the...

What started as a row over lemonade could end up with international airlines being forced to employ French speakers on all flights that serve Canada, a country where French and English are classed as official languages. An MP in Canada, Stephane Dion, has lodged a bill with parliament that if passed would oblige all flights to and from Canada to have a French speaker on board and for all passenger announcements to be made in both English and French. The inspiration for his bill lies in an argument over a lemonade on an AirCanada flight between Toronto and North Carolina...

A group of zealous supporters of Sen. Ted Cruz’ (R-TX) 2016 presidential run is planning to launch a ‘Ted Cruz Air Force’ (TCAF) in the coming months prior to the Republican primaries that begin in less than a year. According to TCAF, “Ted Cruz clearly has the support of the grassroots. He will also have air support.” TCAF says its most prominent air feature will be the “Ted Cruz Blimp,” but it also plans on recruiting “antique aircraft, towed aerial banners, light sport aircraft … [and] parachutes.” Member of TCAF Jerry Collette says he’s going to do everything he can...

The roar of Super Dave Mathieson's aerobatic aircraft has been grounded over noise complaints. The full-time air show pilot, who made Chilliwack his home base a few years ago, received notification from Transport Canada earlier this month that he could no longer perform the aerobatics under 2000 feet at Chilliwack Airport, citing proximity to "noise sensitive or livestock" areas.

When Hilda Gurney’s name crops up, they love to tell stories about her switcheroo involving aviator Charles Lindbergh at the Van Nuys Airport. The pilot and her co­pilot husband, Harlan “Bud” Gurney, decided in 1969 to take out a small plane, and Lindbergh — a close friend of the family who often stayed with them when he was in Los Angeles — asked if he could fly alongside. But the press got wind of the renowned aviator up in the SoCal skies, and reporters descended upon the airport to wait for his landing. Wise to the plan, Lindbergh and the...

A paratrooper who was preparing to leave the US army decided that he would make his last parachute jump more memorable by taking along a fish. The day before his final jump on April 11, Spc. Matthew Tattersall went out and purchased a Siamese fighter, which he called 'Willy Makeit'. He placed the fish in a water bottle and poked a few holes into it to allow air to get in. Then he hid the bottle in his pocket as he knew he wouldn't be allowed to jump from the plane with the fish. "That's my pet fish named Willy...

The finding by the Government Accountability Office presents chilling new scenarios for passengers. The report doesn't suggest it would be easy to do, or very likely. But it points out that as airlines and the Federal Aviation Administration attempt to modernize planes and flight tracking with Internet-based technology, attackers have a new vulnerability they could exploit. The avionics in a cockpit operate as a self-contained unit and aren't connected to the same system used by passengers to watch movies or work on their laptops. But as airlines update their systems with Internet-based networks, it's not uncommon for Wi-Fi systems to...

Immediately after takeoff from Sea-Tac, the pilot “reported hearing banging from beneath the aircraft,” according to the airline. “The captain immediately returned to Seattle, declaring an emergency for priority landing,” the statement said. “The aircraft was in the air for 14 minutes. After landing, a ramp agent was found inside the front cargo hold, which is pressurized and temperature controlled.”

... The Delta Honor Guard is a group of employees and baggage handlers at Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport in Atlanta, Georgia. What they do for Fallen Soldiers is extremely touching ...

India is likely to buy about 60 Rafale combat jets from Dassault Aviation instead of 126 aircraft proposed in the original request for proposal meant to be procured in under the process that began some eight years ago, highly placed sources said. The decision to buy nearly three-and-a-half squadrons (between 60 and 63 aircraft) of Rafale jets for the Indian Air Force was taken at the highest political level hours before Prime Minister Narendra Modi embarked on his three-nation tour on Thursday, April 9, the sources added. Given the huge financial and operational implications, the government thought it prudent to...

It’s wrong to compare the F-35 with any other asset that was designed to perform a specific mission: this is, in simple words, what a U.S. F-35 pilot said in an interview he gave to the Danish website focusing on military topics Krigeren. Interviewed at Luke Air Force Base, by Christian Sundsdal, Maj. John Wilson, an F-35 pilot with an F-16 background clearly explained something that is quite obvious to everyone: an A-10 Thunderbolt II will always be better in CAS than the F-35 because it was designed to perform that kind of mission. Similarly, an F-22 will always be...

Russian air force officers this month started conducting acceptance trials on the first batch of Ka-52 attack helicopters that are being completed at the Russian Helicopters’ Progress plant in Arsenyev on Russia’s Pacific coast. The Ka-52 is a two-seat development of the Ka-50, which has been in service since the turn of the century. Progress is scheduled to deliver 16 Ka-52s to Russian Army Aviation this year. According to Yuri Denisenko, the plant’s general director, the framework contract between the Russian Helicopters and the Russian defense ministry calls for shipments of 146 Ka-52s by 2020. The Ka-52 has a side-by-side...