aviation technology

ATIS Oct 17, 2026

The FAA Ownership Stake in Air Space Intelligence and What It Means for the Future of Air Traffic Control

The FAA is seeking an equity stake in Air Space Intelligence, maker of the Flyways AI platform - raising conflict-of-interest questions about regulatory independence.

Tower

Cleared Direct Oct 17, 2026

The Lilium Jet, the Thirty-Six Ducted Fans That Rejected Every Other eVTOL Playbook, and What the Bankruptcy and Rebirth of Germany's Air Taxi Gamble Tells Us About the Real Cost of Going First

Lilium burned $1 billion and went bankrupt in October 2024 before being revived - revealing eVTOL's real certification and capital challenges.

Vector

Cleared Direct Oct 16, 2026

The GE Catalyst Turboprop, the First Clean-Sheet Design in Fifty Years, and What Full-Authority Digital Engine Control Does to the Way Pilots Manage Power

The GE Catalyst is the first clean-sheet turboprop engine design in roughly 50 years, promising 20% better fuel efficiency and single-lever FADEC control for the Cessna Denali.

Vector

Cleared Direct Oct 16, 2026

Wisk Aero's Generation Six, the Fully Autonomous Passenger Aircraft With No Pilot Controls, and the Certification Problem Nobody Has Solved Before

Wisk Aero is pursuing FAA certification for a fully pilotless passenger aircraft, arguing redundant automation can be statistically safer than a human pilot.

Vector

Cleared Direct Oct 15, 2026

The Pipistrel Velis Electro, the EASA Type Certificate That Made It the First Certified Electric Aircraft in History, and What Real-World Training Operations Have Taught Us About Electric Flight

The Pipistrel Velis Electro was the world's first type-certified electric aircraft, receiving its EASA type certificate on June 10, 2020.

Vector

Cleared Direct Oct 15, 2026

The Pipistrel Velis Electro, the First Type-Certified Electric Aircraft, and What Three Years of European Training Data Reveals About the Real Limits of Electric Propulsion

The Pipistrel Velis Electro is the world's first fully type-certified electric aircraft, and three years of European training data reveal where electric propulsion genuinely works.

Vector

Cleared Direct Oct 14, 2026

ACAS X, the Algorithm Replacing TCAS, and the Collision Avoidance Architecture Being Built for an Airspace Full of Aircraft That Have No Pilot Aboard

ACAS X replaces TCAS's decades-old fixed lookup tables with real-time dynamic programming, cutting nuisance alerts and extending collision avoidance to unmanned aircraft.

Vector

The Hangar Oct 13, 2026

The Messerschmitt Two Sixty-Two, Adolf Galland's Fighter of the Gods, and the Jet That Came Too Late to Save the Luftwaffe

The Me 262 flew 100 mph faster than any Allied fighter, yet Hitler's bomber directive and production failures kept it from reaching the front until Germany had already lost.

Taildragger

Cleared Direct Oct 12, 2026

Boom Supersonic's Overture, the X-B One Demonstrator, and the Economics of Commercial Supersonic Flight Twenty-Two Years After Concorde's Last Landing at Heathrow

Boom Supersonic has raised over $1 billion and flown a supersonic demonstrator - but engine certification, regulatory uncertainty, and airline order conversions remain unresolved.

Vector

ATIS Oct 11, 2026

Edgewing's Turin Hub and the Multinational Engineering Effort Behind the GCAP Combat Aircraft

Edgewing has opened a new engineering hub in Turin, Italy to advance the UK-Italy-Japan Global Combat Air Programme, targeting a sixth-generation combat aircraft by 2035.

Tower

Cleared Direct Oct 11, 2026

The NASA X-59 QueSST, the Shaped Sonic Boom, and the Fifty-Year-Old FAA Rule That May Finally Be Ready to Change

NASA's X-59 QueSST aircraft is designed to prove that shaped sonic boom technology can produce sound quiet enough to overturn a 50-year FAA ban on overland supersonic flight.

Vector

Cleared Direct Oct 11, 2026

TIS-B, the Radar-Derived Traffic Uplink Behind Your ADS-B In Display, and the Coverage Hockey Puck Most Pilots Don't Know Exists

TIS-B fills your ADS-B In display with radar-derived traffic, but a 15-nautical-mile 'hockey puck' service volume and 12-second radar lag create gaps most pilots don't know exist.

Vector

Cleared Direct Oct 8, 2026

The Boeing X Thirty-Seven B, the Space Force's Orbital Test Vehicle That Has Been Flying Autonomous Missions for Fifteen Years, and What an Unmanned Space Plane That Lands on a Runway Tells Us About Where Aviation Is Going

The Boeing X-37B has completed six fully autonomous orbital missions since 2010 - including one lasting 908 days - and lands itself on a runway every time.

Vector

Cleared Direct Oct 7, 2026

Reliable Robotics, the Autonomous Caravan, and the Cargo-First Certification Strategy That Could Put Pilotless Aircraft in Your Pattern

Reliable Robotics is retrofitting Cessna 208 Caravans with autonomous flight systems, targeting cargo-first FAA certification for remote aviation operations.

Vector

Cleared Direct Oct 7, 2026

The Stratolaunch Roc, the Twin-Fuselage Carrier Aircraft With the Largest Wingspan Ever Built, and the Air-Launch Strategy That Returns Hypersonic Testing to Its Mojave Roots

The Stratolaunch Roc, the largest aircraft ever built by wingspan at 385 feet, is reviving air-launch hypersonic testing with its reusable Talon A vehicle.

Vector

Cleared Direct Oct 6, 2026

ForeFlight, the App That Replaced a Drawer Full of Paper Charts, and What the Boeing Acquisition Actually Means for the Pilots Who Fly With It Every Day

ForeFlight is the dominant Electronic Flight Bag platform in aviation - here's how it works, what it costs, and what Boeing's 2019 acquisition means for pilots who depend on it.

Vector

Cleared Direct Oct 6, 2026

ZeroAvia, the Hydrogen Fuel Cell Powertrain, and the Infrastructure Problem That Is Harder Than the Engineering

ZeroAvia's hydrogen fuel cell technology has proven itself in flight, but airport infrastructure - not engineering - is the constraint that will determine when and where hydrogen-powered regional aircraft actually enter service.

Vector

Cleared Direct Oct 5, 2026

Boom Supersonic's XB-1, the Overture Airliner, and What It Would Actually Take to Put Passengers Back Above Mach One Over the Atlantic

Boom Supersonic's XB-1 demonstrator crossed Mach 1.122 over Mojave on January 9, 2025 - the first commercially-funded supersonic flight in U.S. airspace in recent memory.

Vector

Cleared Direct Oct 5, 2026

Honeywell Anthem, the Pilatus PC-12 NGX Debut, and the Connected Cockpit Architecture That Updates Like a Smartphone

Honeywell Anthem is the first production-certified avionics platform using a partitioned architecture that separates the safety-critical core from a cloud-updatable connected layer - and it's already flying.

Vector

Cleared Direct Oct 4, 2026

Reliable Robotics, the Cessna Caravan They Taught to Fly Itself, and the Retrofit Strategy That Sidesteps the Blank-Sheet Certification Nightmare

Reliable Robotics has flown a fully autonomous Cessna Caravan and is pursuing a retrofit certification strategy that could reshape autonomous cargo aviation.

Vector