The gigantic Stratolaunch program, envisioned and spearheaded by the late Paul G. Allen, has successfully completed the first flight of the world’s largest all-composite aircraft.
With a dual fuselage design and wingspan greater than the length of an American football field, the Stratolaunch aircraft took flight at 0658 PDT, Saturday, from the Mojave Air & Space Port. Achieving a maximum speed of 189 miles per hour, the plane flew for 2.5 hours over the Mojave Desert at altitudes up to 17,000 feet. As part of the initial flight, the pilots evaluated aircraft performance and handling qualities before landing. SpaceIL got ever so close, but in the end was not able to land its Beresheet lunar lander on the surface of the Moon. The landing attempt was planned for 3:25 p.m. Thursday afternoon. At about 3:24, controllers announced they had lost contact with the spacecraft. About two minutes later, they reported that they had been unsuccessful in the landing attempt. The rocket motor apparently cut out during the descent. It was successfully restarted, but then contact was lost. The SpaceIL team quickly realized that their landing was not going to be a success. Last
week the long-awaited Polish FLARIS LAR1 jet took to the skies for the first time, testing the optimal take-off and landing configuration and to check overall control and stability. Despite high winds, and crosswinds, the five-seat plane made twenty six takeoffs and landings, under the command of Wieslaw Cena, an experienced experimental test pilot. All this -- and MORE in today's episode of Airborne!!!
Airborne 04.15.19 is chock full of info in this Daily News Episode, Monday, April 15th, 2019... Presented by Aero-TV veteran videographer and Airborne Hosts Sophie Hurlock, Laura Hutson, Brianne Cross, and Christopher Odom, and is supported by ANN CEO/Editor-In-Chief Jim Campbell, Chief Videographer Nathan Cremisino, and Aero-Journalist Tom Patton, this episode covers:
- It Flies! Stratolaunch Completes MASSIVE First Flight
- SpaceIL Moon Landing Attempt Unsuccessful
- Flaris 1 Finally Takes Flight
- Sonaca Aircraft Unveils The Sonaca 200 Trainer Pro At AERO Friedrichshafen
- Michael Avenatti's Jet Seized By Federal Authorities
- Harris Awarded $84 Million Contract To Produce Experimental Space Vehicle
- Rotax Releases New 915 iS Service Bulletin
Get Comprehensive, Real-Time, 24/7 coverage of the latest aviation and aerospace stories anytime, at aero-news.net. And be sure to join us again for the next edition of "Airborne Unlimited" here on Aero-TV. Thanks for watching. See you, again, tomorrow!
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