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Senator Graham aggressively fought President Obama's union appointees at the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) when they filed a frivolous complaint against Boeing's decision to build a production facility in South Carolina. The labor unions were so upset about Lindsey's efforts they retaliated by filing a baseless ethics charge. Lindsey's response: "I will not be intimidated." He refused to back down, the ethics charge was dismissed, and Boeing prevailed - saving thousands of South Carolina jobs. Lindsey has introduced legislation to restrict the NLRB's authority and prohibit the NLRB from having a say in where American companies can do business....

Somebody on Twitter posted an upbeat message saying the US delegation to the latest round of talks with Iranian officials was quite optimistic. Don’t get me wrong, I’m a born optimist and I love optimism, but I’d rather revel in victory than hope for good news, and the Iranians have every reason to revel. The Obama crowd has just ok’d something the Tehran tyrants have desperately wanted since the eighties: spare parts [1] for their long-grounded American passenger aircraft. Boeing and General Electric were given export licenses by the Treasury Department and everyone involved has been chanting “we take...

WASHINGTON/PARIS (Reuters) - Boeing Co , the world's biggest airplane maker, on Friday said it had received a license from the U.S. Treasury Department to export certain spare parts for commercial aircraft to Iran under a temporary sanctions relief deal that began in January.

(Jon Ostrower and I Made Sentana contributed to this article.) ...officially both sides said cooperation between the two countries is good. But people familiar with both countries' efforts say that isn't always the case. :snip: "Washington seems to be a leaky boat," said one person familiar with the Malaysian investigation. "It erodes trust." Nevertheless, this person said concern about the Americans' role isn't seriously impeding the investigation. "We have been surprised at how many people we have been able to rope into this," this person said. :snip: Boeing, without the full involvement of Malaysian investigators, has run some computer models...

LOS ANGELES (AP) — An unmanned experimental aircraft failed during an attempt to fly at six times the speed of sound in the latest setback for hypersonic flight. The X-51A Waverider was designed to reach Mach 6, or 3,600 mph, after being dropped by a B-52 bomber off the Southern California coast on Tuesday. Engineers hoped it would sustain its top speed for five minutes, twice as long as an X-51A has gone before. But the Air Force said Wednesday that a faulty control fin prevented it from starting its exotic scramjet engine and it was lost.

Here are the top five aerial weapons that one day could change the face of modern warfare. Relying on the most advanced technology in the world, these hyper-advanced projectiles may outmaneuver, outrun, and outmatch America’s foes around the globe, whenever the need arises. 1) The Mach-5 Cruise Missile If a cruise-missile at supersonic speed is a full-throttle Ford Mustang, then a missile that hits Mach 5 is a Formula 1 racer going all out. The problem is, that hypersonic Mach 5 pace — clocking in at five times the speed of sound– has yet to be reached by munitions. Until...

coondoggie writes "The aspiration that jets may someday fly at over six times the speed of sound took a very real step toward reality recently, as the US Air Force said it successfully married the test aircraft, known as the X-51A WaveRider, to a B-52 in preparation for a Dec. 2 flight test. The X-51A flight tests are intended to demonstrate that the engines can achieve their desired speed without disintegrating. While the X-51 looks like a large rocket now, its applications could change the way aircraft or spaceships are designed, fly into space, support reconnaissance missions and handle long-distance...

The Space Shuttle may be dead, but the Air Force is looking to pick up the slack. Last month they launched their secret space plane, the X-37B, from a base from Florida. The spacecraft is currently on the first part of a top secret nine month mission that will end with a soft landing in California. So is the X-37B the Air Force's first foray into creating the world's first starfighter? Absolutely, not says the Air Force. Gary E. Payton, under secretary of the Air Force for space programs says that the plane carries "no offensive capabilities." He states, "The...

A recent United States Air Force scramjet test has hinted at a future where hypersonic vehicles streak through the sky at many times the speed of sound around the world, and perhaps even open up access to space. The experimental X-51A Waverider used a rocket booster and an air-breathing scramjet to reach a speed of Mach 5 and achieve the longest hypersonic flight ever powered by such an engine on May 26. That technology might not only deliver cargo quickly to different parts of the globe, but could also transform the space industry and spawn true space planes that take...

Hypersonic missiles Speed is the new stealth Hypersonic weapons: Building vehicles that fly at five times the speed of sound is amazingly hard, but researchers are trying ON AUGUST 20th 1998 Bill Clinton ordered American warships in the Arabian Sea to fire a volley of more than 60 Tomahawk cruise missiles at suspected terrorist training camps near the town of Khost in eastern Afghanistan. The missiles, flying north at about 880kph (550mph), took two hours to reach their target. Several people were killed, but the main target of the attack, Osama bin Laden, left the area shortly before the missiles...

What's faster than a speeding bullet, doesn't require a cape and isn't deterred by kryptonite? It's called the X-51 Waverider...and is the latest creation of Boeing and Pratt and Whitney Rocketdyne. This past May it completed the longest hypersonic combustion (scramjet) powered flight in aviation history, reaching a speed of about Mach five, or five times the speed of sound. A scramjet engine is often likened to an air-breathing engine...it has no moving parts, and sucks in air from the atmosphere, rather than using oxidizers or additional fuel. It is new technology engineers say will allow aircraft to fly faster...

An aircraft resembling a large bodyboard detached from a flying B-52 bomber and then shot across the Pacific on Wednesday at more than 3,500 mph, shattering aviation records and reigniting decades-long efforts to develop a vehicle that could travel faster than a speeding bullet. The unmanned X-51 WaveRider, powered by an air-breathing hypersonic engine that has virtually no moving parts, was launched midair off the coast near Point Mugu. It sped westward for 200 seconds before plunging into the ocean as planned. Previous attempts at hypersonic flights lasted no more than 10 seconds. "Everything went very well for a first...

<p>An experimental scramjet-powered, ultrahigh speed strike vehicle is emerging as the Pentagon’s main choice for a new long-range, rapid attack weapon, a senior Pentagon official says.</p> <p>Alan R. Shaffer, principal deputy assistant defense secretary for research and engineering, told a defense industry conference that prototypes and recent tests proved concepts for hypersonic arms, and several systems are part of a high-priority effort by Pentagon weapons developers, despite the era of sharply-diminished defense spending.</p>

Boeing's X-51 WaveRider has made aviation history by completing the longest ever supersonic* combustion ramjet-powered flight. The unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) flew for almost three and a half minutes in the skies off the southern California coast on Wednesday, reaching an altitude of about 70,000 feet and hitting hypersonic (Mach 5) speeds. The X-51 WaveRider scramjet (supersonic combustion ramjet) is being developed for the Air Force Research Laboratory and the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) by Boeing and Pratt & Whitney Rocketdyne. The goal of the program is to create a free-flying, scramjet-powered vehicle capable of operating continuously on...

The US Air Force on Wednesday test launched a hypersonic cruise missile, with the vehicle accelerating to Mach 6 before splashing down in the Pacific Ocean, officials said. The Air Force said the test flight of the X-15A Waverider lasted more than 200 seconds, the longest ever hypersonic flight powered by scramjet propulsion. The previous record was 12 seconds in a NASA X-43 vehicle. "We are ecstatic to have accomplished most of our test points on the X-51A's very first hypersonic mission," Charlie Brink, program manager with the Air Force Research Laboratory at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base in Ohio. "We...

PALMDALE - The next step in hypersonic flight test is under development in a hangar at The Boeing Co.'s facility at Air Force Plant 42. The unmanned X-51A "Wave­Rider" is a scramjet engine flight demonstrator, expected to provide flight test data at speeds beyond Mach 6 - about one mile per second - using its unique engine design. In a scramjet - or supersonic combustion ramjet - engine, air is scooped into the engine duct, then forced through a combustion chamber, where fuel is mixed in and ignited. This produces energy, which is forced out the rear of the engine...

I've had sources ask to meet me in some pretty odd places. But there was one meeting last year that had to be just about the strangest request yet. It wasn't just that this very-recently retired Defense Department strategist wanted to meet at the Pentagon City Mall -- that's a pretty common place to grab an off-the-record cup o' joe. It was where in the mall he had in mind: at the Nordstrom's coffee shop, tucked all the way in the far reaches of the store, just past the little kid's clothes section. So I walk past the rows of...

EDWARDS AFB - The base that first broke the sound barrier is once again pushing the boundaries of flight test, this time with sustained flight at hypersonic speeds. The Air Force Flight Test Center at Edwards Air Force Base is responsible for the upcoming flight test of the X-51, a vehicle designed to travel at speeds greater than five times the speed of sound. The project takes on special meaning as no hypersonic project has made it to the flight test phase in a number of years, he said. The last one - also from Edwards - was NASA's X-43A,...

Following the longest flight yet by an air-breathing scramjet engine, the X-51A Waverider team is waiting to see whether the largely successful first launch of the hypersonic demonstrator will unlock funding for further development of the ­technology. The X-51A was launched over the Pacific on May 26, achieving scramjet ignition and acceleration, but the engine ran for only 200 sec. rather than the 300 sec. planned, and the vehicle reached around Mach 5 instead of accelerating beyond Mach 6. When it began to slow down and telemetry was lost, the flight was terminated and the vehicle destroyed, says Charles Brink,...

The dreams of being able to fly from New York to London in under an hour are once again put on hold, as the latest effort to fly at over five times the speed of sound has ended in failure. A US Air Force test of a missile that is supposed to travel at six times the speed of sound has ended in failure when the vehicle went out of control and crashed in the Pacific Ocean. It is still unclear what went wrong with the test flight. However, it joins a long list of failed hypersonic flights that shows...

This could well be the most outrageous insult yet to the free market economy: In what may be the strongest signal yet of the new pro-labor orientation of the National Labor Relations Board under President Obama, the agency filed a complaint Wednesday seeking to force Boeing to bring an airplane production line back to its unionized facilities in Washington State instead of moving the work to a nonunion plant in South Carolina. Do I need to explain how many kinds of wrong this is? Not only is the federal government saying to Boeing that it gets to decide where it...

Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia (CNN) -- For families whose loved ones were aboard the missing Malaysia Airlines plane, the past day has been full of news they were dreading. First, a grim-faced Malaysian Prime Minister confirmed their worst fears, announcing Flight 370 went down somewhere in the Indian Ocean.

“LIGNET put out a report, substantiated yesterday, that there sources got their information from Boeing sources, which is covert. Not that they got their information from the Boeing Company because they’re involved in the investigation, that the airplane was in Pakistan. That was confirmed by LIGNET on Monday and I got another source at LIGNET that confirmed it yesterday… I do believe that those people in Pakistan, in the ISI, those people who knew where Osama Bin Laden was and didn’t tell us. I believe those same elements could be involved with getting that airplane into a Pakistan air force...

Full title - "BREAKING: Lt. Gen. McInerney Says #MH370 In Pakistan – “I Got A Source at LIGNET That Confirmed It Yesterday” (Video)" Retired Lt. General Thomas McInerney was on America’s News HQ today to once again discuss his theory that missing flight MH370 flew to Pakistan. McInerney and LIGNET Intel Group still believe the plane flew to Pakistan. Posted by Jim Hoft on Saturday, March 22, 2014, 2:26 PM Retired Lt. General Thomas McInerney was on America’s News HQ today to once again discuss his theory that missing flight MH370 flew to Pakistan. McInerney and LIGNET Intel Group still...

Megyn Kelly broke this news tonight on The Kelly File. Intel group Langley Intelligence Group says its Boeing source says the plane manufacturer believes the missing Malaysian flight MH370 is inside Pakistan. A LIGNET analyst received information from a source at Boeing that the company believes the plane did land in Pakistan… Boeing spokesman Sean McCormack denied that Wednesday, telling LIGNET that “the Boeing Company does not have information that substantiates your claim.” Retired Lt. Col. Thomas McInerney was on with Megyn to discuss this theory. McInerney said the flight from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing is about the same distance...

Appearing on Fox & Friends last week, retired United States Air Force Gen. Thomas McInerney speculated that the missing Malaysian passenger airliner had been intentionally flown to South Asia where it could be used as a delivery vehicle for conventional or nuclear explosives by terrorist actors. On Tuesday, McInerney repeated that claim and said that the recent actions of the Israeli and American governments lent credence to that theory.

Retired Air Force General Thomas McInerney isn’t backing away from his thriller novel-like suggestion that the missing Malaysian Airlines flight could have very well landed in Pakistan — and he says his theory is based on more than mere conjecture. “General, I’ve known you a long time, I know you too well to know that you’re not just making this up, this is not something you’ve concocted. You’ve spoken to a number of people, am I correct?” Sean Hannity asked McInerney during Tuesday night’s episode of “Hannity” on Fox News. “Yes, but that’s all I want to say, Sean, please,”...

Retired Lt. General Thomas McInerney was back on with Sean Hannity tonight and still stands by his original statements that missing MH370 landed and did not crash into the ocean. “I think those passengers have the potential to still being alive. And I believe that airplane landed. I believe the airplane has landed and I’ve listened to a lot of aviation experts and none of them know anything about radical Islam. And I think that was one of the major shortcomings to think that as well planned as this was, and you just went through it with Mr. Kay, on...

You Will Not Find This Video on Fox in Any Search. It was posted on the 19th and summarily removed by Fox due to Pressure From White House. Transcript: Tonight the Government of Malaysia is now reporting turning to Pakistan to help find the missing plane. That News comes as an intel group is claiming that a source within Boeing is claiming that this airplane is in Pakistan right now as we first reported Last night. The jet reportedly change course shortly after take off adding fuel to the hijacking theory, in other words they had made the change and...

Lt. General Thomas McInerney USAF (ret) is a man to be reckoned with, and he has gone out on a limb citing sources he cannot reveal for his assertion that Malaysia Airlines 370 was taken by a criminal act, that the United States government knows more than it is revealing, and that the airplane could well be on the ground on Pakistan.

Hannity interviewed Gen McInerny who surmises the missing plane landed in Taliban controlled Pakistan airfield.

The Malaysian government reportedly is investigating the possibility that missing Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370 avoided radar detection and landed in Pakistan near the Afghanistan border inside Taliban-controlled territory, according to the UK Independent . . . investigators confiscated a homemade flight simulator from the pilot’s home to see if it reveals any useful information . . . the Malaysian foreign minister told reporters that Malaysia asked several Asian countries for assistance in its investigation, including Pakistan . . . Pakistan dismissed the idea that a Boeing 777 could land undetected inside the country but promised to work with the Malaysian...

If multiple communication systems aboard Flight 370 were manually disabled, as investigators increasingly suspect happened, it would have required detailed knowledge of the long-range Boeing777's inner workings. The Wall Street Journal said the first loss of the jet's transponder, which communicates the jet's position, speed and call sign to air traffic control radar, would require disabling a circuit breaker above and behind an overhead panel. Pilots rarely, if ever, need to access the circuit breakers, which are reserved for maintenance personnel. Pulling one specific circuit breaker, which is labeled, would render inoperative both of the 777's transponders, according to documents...

Slightly used Boeing 777-300 for sale. Asking for $15,000,000 USD, or best offer (this includes all the snacks in the plane). Not much fuel in the plane at the moment, but it's in great flying condition. ABSOLUTELY NO JOY RIDES! SOLD AS--IS. NO TRADES OR RETURNS. ALL DEALS ARE FINAL. Ask for Fariq when calling and setting up appointments to see the plane. •do NOT contact me with unsolicited services or offers

Commercial aviation pilots tell NPR that they would have no idea how to disable all the systems designed to automatically communicate with ground stations, though they could probably figure it out from checklists and other documentation available aboard an aircraft. Aircraft such as the Malaysia Airlines Boeing 777, which disappeared over the Gulf of Thailand a week ago, are equipped with transponders that give their position to air traffic control. The transponders can be switched off with a flick of a switch. But modern planes like the 777 have two other systems as well: cockpit radios and a text-based system...

Months before Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 mysteriously vanished, US regulators warned of a "cracking and corrosion" problem on Boeing 777s that could lead to a mid-air breakup and drastic drop in cabin pressure. The revelation comes amid a desperate search for traces of the plane with 239 people on board, which lost contact with air traffic control at around 1730 GMT Friday, about an hour after take-off from Kuala Lumpur en route to Beijing..

FULL TITLE: Special Conditions: Boeing Model 777-200, -300, and -300ER Series Airplanes; Aircraft Electronic System Security Protection From Unauthorized Internal AccessEXCERPT: Discussion The integrated network configurations in the Boeing Model 777-200, -300, and -300ER series airplanes may enable increased connectivity with external network sources and will have more interconnected networks and systems, such as passenger entertainment and information services than previous airplane models. This may enable the exploitation of network security vulnerabilities and increased risks potentially resulting in unsafe conditions for the airplanes and occupants. This potential exploitation of security vulnerabilities may result in intentional or unintentional destruction, disruption, degradation,...

<p>MILAN (AP) — Foreign ministry officials in Rome and Vienna confirm that names of two nationals listed on the manifest of the missing Malaysian airlines flight match passports reported stolen in Thailand.</p> <p>Italy's Foreign Ministry said Saturday that an Italian man whose name was listed as being aboard is traveling in Thailand and was not aboard the plane.</p>

Boeing Co said on Friday that "hairline cracks" had been discovered in the wings of about 40 787 Dreamliners that are in production, marking another setback for the company's newest jet. The cracks have not been found on planes that are in use by airlines and therefore posed no safety risk, Boeing said, adding the problem also will not alter Boeing's plans to deliver 110 787s this year. Wing-maker Mitsubishi Heavy Industries Ltd notified Boeing in February of the problem, which arose after the Japanese company altered its manufacturing process. He added that the manufacturing change was probably aimed at...

<p>South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley didn’t mince words when she spoke about unions at an automotive conference in Greenville this week. The state loves its manufacturing jobs from BMW, Michelin and Boeing and welcomes more, she explained, but not if they’re bringing a unionized workforce with them.</p>

Australia has confirmed that it will acquire eight Boeing P-8A Poseidon maritime patrol aircraft, with the first examples to be delivered in 2017. The aircraft will be fully operational by 2021, says prime minister Tony Abbott in a statement. His statement pegs the deal’s value at A$4 billion ($3.6 billion). “These state-of-the-art aircraft will dramatically boost Australia’s ability to monitor its maritime approaches and patrol over 2.5 million square kilometres of our marine jurisdiction – an area equating to nearly 4 per cent of the world’s oceans,” says Abbott. Canberra has also approved an option for an additional four examples....

Rejections by India and more recently Brazil – combined with the looming end to a multi-year procurement deal for the US Navy – mean that the pressure is mounting on Boeing to secure extra orders for its versatile Super Hornet. As things stand, the last F/A-18E/F or EA-18G Growler will roll off the line in St Louis, Missouri before the end of 2016, with the USN and Royal Australian Air Force the buyers so far. As you can read in my colleague Jon Hemmerdinger’s report on the situation, that’s not a major problem for the manufacturer for now, but Washington...

Boeing is struggling to complete 787 fuselage sections in South Carolina since a production rate increase, and sections are arriving in Everett more unfinished and problematic than before. Since late last year, Boeing 787 Dreamliner fuselage sections from North Charleston, S.C., have arrived at the Everett final assembly line seriously incomplete with wiring and hydraulics lines missing, according to multiple sources in the factory. The poorly done work out of Charleston threatens to undermine the company’s plans to deliver 10 Dreamliners a month and fulfill the much-delayed jet program’s original promise. “It’s snowballing. The planes are getting worse out of...

U.S. aircraft manufacturer Boeing has silently delivered the first airborne early-warning and control (AEW&C) aircraft to Turkey under a program that was launched more than a decade ago. Now, however, the buyer and the seller are wrangling over penalties for delays. The defense procurement agency, the Undersecretariat for Defense Industries (SSM), and the Turkish Air Force simultaneously announced Jan. 31 that the AEW&C aircraft had arrived in Turkey for acceptance tests. The tests are to be followed by an inauguration ceremony Feb. 21 at the 3rd Main Jet Base Command in Konya, they said. Last year, Defense Minister İsmet Yılmaz...

Boeing painted a plane with the Seahawks logo, including a big 12, and today that plane is flying over eastern Washington in a 12 pattern. You can see the progress here. There are signs with "12" on them all over Seattle. This town is totally into it.

A new Boeing Co. (BA) surveillance aircraft deployed to Japan last month isn’t yet effective at hunting submarines or performing reconnaissance over large areas -- two of its main missions, the Pentagon’s weapons tester found. Flaws in the $35 billion program included the plane’s radar performance, sensor integration and data transfer, Michael Gilmore, chief of the Pentagon testing office, wrote in his annual report on major weapons, which has yet to be released. He said the new P-8A Poseidon exhibited “all of the major deficiencies” identified in earlier exercises when subjected to more stressful realistic combat testing from September 2012...

Boeing Co is hiring contract workers at its factory in South Carolina as it boosts output of the 787 Dreamliner and seeks to avoid manufacturing issues linked to the production increase, according to people familiar with the situation. Boeing confirmed on Wednesday that it is hiring at the facility but declined to provide details. The company was responding to a Wall Street Journal report that said the aircraft maker is adding about 300 contract mechanics and inspectors at its North Charleston facility. The Journal said the contractors were needed in part to avoid production issues with 787 body sections made...

Battery problems resurfaced on Boeing's 787 on Tuesday, after gas was discovered coming out of a battery on a plane parked in Tokyo. Boeing said the problem on a Japan Airlines 787 was discovered during scheduled maintenance. No passengers were on board. The company said it appears that a single battery cell 'vented', or released gas. The incident comes a year after a fire in a lithium ion battery aboard a Japan Airlines 787 parked at Boston's Logan International Airport.

The separate complaints focus on the timing of the union vote that narrowly approved Boeing’s 777X contract extension.Four individual Machinists at Boeing have filed separate complaints with the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) seeking to overturn the 777X contract extension vote that passed by a slim margin last week. Anne Pomerantz, NLRB regional attorney, said the agency will investigate the charges, gather evidence and decide if any action is warranted. The process typically takes approximately 12 weeks, she said. The union members filed the unfair labor practices claims against the national headquarters of the International Association of Machinists (IAM), which...