Aviation Week & Space Technology

Lower cost is key for Europe’s future launchers.

From full speed ahead to slamming on the brakes: The Civil Aviation Administration of China (CAAC) has formally tightened rules on setting up airlines, around five months after it suspended authorizations, unannounced.

Bell Helicopter plans to offer tiltrotors for almost every anticipated U.S. military requirement as its V-280 Valor prototype comes together in Amarillo, Texas.

In this week’s Washington Outlook, the U.S. will provide $38 billion in military to Israel over the next 10 years; business groups want to restore Ex-Im bank’s ability to approve major deals; and the Air Force needs more time to upgrade its air traffic avionics systems.

Boeing is taking no chances on the U.S. Air Force’s T-X trainer competition, which may save its St. Louis factory when F-15 and F/A-18 production ends.

Singapore Airlines is not extending the lease for its first Airbus A380, another blow for the manufacturer and the struggling program.

While Iridium has been able to raise the $3 billion needed to build and orbit the new system, which includes spares for backup, getting back to space has been a challenge.

Eric Dautriat has retired as executive director of Clean Sky after seven years leading Europe’s major public-private partnership for civil aeronautics research.

From meager beginnings, this small Miami-based avionics is fast becoming a global powerhouse to supply the backbone for aircraft connectivity.

Aircraft are ever more connected to the internet, in the cabin, the cockpit and to the maintenance shop.

Satellite fleet operators old and new see rising growth in aeronautic, maritime broadband.

When aerospace executives look at digital opportunities, too many use the traditional technology lens without sufficiently evaluating business model impacts.

With about $40 million a year to spend, the agency’s Convergent Aeronautics Solutions project has so far funded 15 subprojects in three annual selection rounds.

In this week's defense roundup: Belarus testing weaponized UAV, Antonov to fly light airlifter before 2017, NRO focuses on ground systems and algorithms, and Indonesia test flies first of five retrofitted C-130Bs.

Among 16 Tigers in Australian Army squadron service, an average of only 3.5 were serviceable in 2015.

Now that connectivity is virtually a given, airlines are beginning to look up and down the value chain for low-cost upgrades that generate big savings.

Still to be revealed are the payload masses for Blue Origin’s two New Glenn variants. Both versions of the new launcher will have a 23-ft. diameter. The two-stage version will stand 270 ft. tall, while the three-stage vehicle will be 313 ft.

Despite SpaceX and Blue Origin’s advances on reusable engines, the 16 old space shuttle engines are the only way right now to power flight crews into space.

An innovative state bureaucracy? South Carolina’s got one—and it has won two key awards, too.

Video footage from the HUD of a U.S. Air Force F-16 records the dramatic moment when its unconscious pilot is saved from certain death by the aircraft’s Automatic Ground Collision Avoidance System.

The unveiling ends months of speculation about Boeing and partner Saab’s mysterious clean-sheet design for the T-X, which seeks to replace the T-38.

ISRO’s satellite center will help train companies to assemble and test spacecraft.

More and more European low-cost carriers are looking into long-haul flying, following the path of Norwegian, Jetstar and Air Asia X.

Double-bubble, blended wing-body, truss-braced wing, hybrid wing-body—they all sound tempting, but which will NASA pick for its next X-plane and what can it afford?

SkyTeam Alliance members Korean Air and Delta Air Lines agree to expand their limited codeshare connections to many more international and U.S. domestic routes beginning in the fourth quarter.