Also: HeliTrak PMA, Aviation’s Next Big Fight, New KC Airport, Verifly, CFM Orders, Purdue Aviation, P&W Expansion

Some of the aviation industry’s worst fears appear to have been confirmed after a recent White House meeting with the executives of many of the country's major airlines. President Donald Trump was reportedly "extraordinarily positive" about the concept of spinning off Air Traffic Control to a private, non-profit corporation. That was the assessment of A4A president and CEO Nick Calio, who attended the meeting. The corporation would likely have strong representation from the

New Algorithms Allow Project Loon Balloons To Loiter Over Specific Areas

The original concept for Alphabet's Project Loon was to launch a ring of balloons that would sail around the planet bringing Internet service to all the good little boys and girls ... er ... to underserved area where such service was spotty or entirely unavailable. But now, it appears that the goal can be reached with far fewer actual aircraft.

'Meteor Sky' Performed At the Canton Tower

In a spectacular display, EHang performed a 1000 UAV formation light show named Meteor Sky at the Guangzhou city center in the sky over the famous Canton Tower at the night of February 11. The display was a celebration of the Chinese traditional Lantern Festival through the art of innovative technology, and bested the world record UAV formation set by Intel’s 500 drone show in Germany in 2016.

Teenager From Korea Is A Competitive Drone Racer

Meet 17-year-old Korean drone pilot GaYeon Mo, whose years of Taekwondo and Wushu training showed her she could take on the boys and win!

Mission Observing The Sun Lasted Nine Years Aboard ISS

The ground control in Belgium has switched off a package that had been continuously watching the Sun from the International Space Station for nine years.

STPSat-6 Satellite Will Host Nine Payloads Supporting National Security And Science

The U.S. Air Force has awarded a contract to Orbital ATK to provide payload integration and support services for Space Test Program Satellite 6 (STPSat-6). The multipurpose satellite will operationally demonstrate advanced communication capabilities, collect space weather data and support nuclear detonation detection in the Earth’s atmosphere or in near space.

Seven Precision Hawk Drones Impounded At Pune International Airport

Two men have been arrested in India for the illegal import of seven Precision Hawk drones made in the United States.

Aerojet Rocketdyne To Receive The Award For Work On NEXT-C Gridded Ion Thruster System

NASA's Glenn Research Center has named Aerojet Rocketdyne as the winner of NASA's Large Business Prime Contractor of the Year award for its work on the space agency’s Next Evolutionary Xenon Thruster-Commercial (NEXT-C) Gridded Ion Thruster System, which was built by Aerojet Rocketdyne.

Focuses On Company's 'Owner-Advocate Approach'

Southern California private jet management and charter operation Silver Air has launched PURE Jet Management, which the company says illustrates the company's vision to be the most innovative and transparent aircraft management solution.

Takeoff Hold Lights (THL) The THL system is composed of in-pavement lighting in a double, longitudinal row of lights aligned either side of the runway centerline. The lights are focused toward the arrival end of the runway at the “line up and wait” point, and they extend for 1,500 feet in front of the holding aircraft. Illuminated red lights indicate to an aircraft in position for takeoff or rolling that it is unsafe to takeoff because the runway is occupied or about to be occupied by an aircraft or vehicle.

Aero Linx: Modification and Replacement Parts Association (MARPA) MARPA is the non-profit trade association that represents the Parts Manufacturer Approval (PMA) community. A PMA is an FAA design and production approval that verifies that the design of an aircraft part meets FAA safety regulations, and the fabrication inspection system meets FAA quality standards designed to assure that every part actually produced continues to meet the FAA-approved design. MARPA's mission is to promote uniform, outstanding standards within the FAA PMA industry. MARPA speaks with a single, powerful voice to the entire worldwide aviation community to elevate awareness and acceptance. MARPA works with government a

Aero-News Quote of the Day "Although our navigation algorithms can get even better, and we need to test them in many other parts of the world, this is a positive sign for Loon’s economic and operational viability. We’ll be able to put together a Loon network over a particular region in weeks not months, and it would be a lot less work to launch and manage. We’ll reduce the number of balloons we need and get greater value out of each one. All of this helps reduce the costs of operating a Loon-powered network, which is good news for the telco partners we’ll work with around the world to make Loon a reality, and critical given that cost has been one key factor keeping rel