Hide/Show Archive Navigation.

All News

May 04, 2020

Airborne 05.04.20: SpaceShipTwo, MAHEPA Electric Drive, Reno 'Rookie School'

Also: Second Boeing 777X Flies, CO Airport Closure Questioned, UK Pilot Union, Skydio Donations

The successful completion of Virgin Galactic’s first SpaceShipTwo test flight from Spaceport America has just taken place. This glide flight marks the inaugural solo flight of VSS Unity in New Mexico. On SpaceShipTwo’s flight deck were Dave Mackay and CJ Sturckow who, together with the team in Mission Control, executed some of the key elements of a spaceflight profile. These included take-off and landing along with high-altitude release from the mothership, VMS Eve, which was piloted by Michael Masucci and Kelly Latimer. The flight took off from the Spaceport America runway, with VSS Unity attached to the carrier aircraft, VMS Eve. The vehicles climbed to an altitude of 50

More Videos

Never Mind The Historical Significance for SpaceX/NASA Manned Flight--Stay Home!

NASA Administrator Administers The COVID-19 Inspired Buzzkill

NASA Boss, Jim Bridenstine, has an unexpected message to space fans, everywhere, who might otherwise have been interested in celebrating the upcoming launch of our first manned mission from US soil in nearly a decade... STAY HOME. Instead, he urged the public to watch the launch online or on TV from home. “The challenge that we’re up against right now is we want to keep everybody safe," Bridenstine noted. "And so we’re asking people not to travel to the Kennedy Space Center, and I will tell you that makes me sad to even say it. Boy, I wish we could make this into something really spectacular.”

Modular Approach To Hybrid-Electric Propulsion Architecture (MAHEPA)

We've been keeping an eye on an interesting project for quite some time... an intriguing, if not exotic power system for Pipistrel's curvy four place Panthera and the Taurus G4. Pipistrel now tells us that the MAHEPA Electric Drive unit, developed by Compact Dynamics with the support of Pipistrel Vertical Solutions, has completed all the qualification tests and is ready to be integrated in the Panthera and Hy4 aircraft. The first flight of MAHEPA novel hybrid-electric aircraft is now one step closer to reality. The MAHEPA Power Train is a powerful and light-weight Electric Drive unit designed to pave the way to achieving ambitious goals for Clean Aviation towards 2050, set by the