Also: Drone Defense, VelocityOne Flightdeck, NASA Turbofan Engine, Block 5 MQ-9A

Sierra Space's "Dream Chaser", the "world's only commercial spaceplane", has begun its final testing phase ahead of planned operations in 2024.

Dream Chaser nestled into the NASA test facility to join Sierra's cargo module, the Shooting Star. Both will be unified in a launch stack for testing in the coming weeks, evaluating their resilience to forces, vibration, and wear. Airspeeder's 2023 EXA Series Championship saw the last of its 3-car races finish this month, capping off the 2023 season with a win to Zephtali Walsh. The win capped off the "world's inaugural three-craft EVTOL race at Stonefield Airfield, South Australia", pitting Airspeeder pilots Bruno Senna, Lexie Janson, and the victorious Walsh against each other. Originally scheduled for Monday, December 18th at 08:30 CST, but scrubbed due to a “ground system issue the team is troubleshooting,” New Shepard 24 launched this morning from their West Texas launch site. Blue Origin showed via live stream  a fully-laden New Shepard take to the skies to rack up its scientific payload count. It brought more than 150 projects into space. All this -- and MORE in today's episode of Airborne-NextGen!!!

Airborne-NextGen 12.19.23 is chock full of info in this Weekly News Episode, Tuesday, December 19th, 2023... Presented by Aero-TV veteran videographer and Airborne Hosts Holland Lee, Sophie Hurlock, Brianne Cross, Christopher Odom, and Laura Hutson, and is supported by ANN CEO/Editor-In-Chief Jim Campbell, and Chief Videographer Nathan Cremisino, this episode covers:

• Sierra Space Dream Chaser Enters Final Test Campaign
• Airspeeder 2023 Championship Concludes
• New Shepard Flies Mission 24
• Drone Defense Gains Extended FAA Support
• Turtle Beach Releases VelocityOne Flightdeck
• NASA Turbofan Engine Core Demo Contract Issued  
• Italian Air Force Takes Flight with Block 5 MQ-9A

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 next week for the next edition of "Airborne-NextGen" here on Aero-TV. Thanks for watching. See you, again, next week!

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