Also: ASTM Vertiport/Vertistop Standards, MQ-8 Fire Scout, SpaceX Dragon, New Shepard’s 23rd Flt

Airbus’s Zephyr 8 UAV, a high-flying critter borne aloft for months on end by vast wings and solar-powered batteries, has a wingspan of 82-feet, weighs a scant 165-pounds, and spent the summer of 2022—most of it, anyway—soaring over the American Southwest.

Regrettably, the Zephyr 8’s summertime sojourn came to an unexpected and tragic end on 19 August, when, for reasons passing understanding, it fell from the Arizona sky just hours short of breaking the 64-day, 22-hour, 19-minute, 05-second continuous flight record set in 1959 by two lunatics in a Cessna 172 Skyhawk. The Bristow Group has gone in on BETA Technologies’ ALIA-250 electronic VTOL aircraft with an order covering up to 55 of the aircraft. The vertical flight specialist seems confident in the new technology, placing an order for 5 initial aircraft with the option to procure 50 more. DJI has unveiled their newest drone, breaking the mold with a compact, sharp little unit geared towards agile, quick recording wherever necessary. The Avata breaks from the usual convention among drones, opting to enclose all 4 electric rotors within an arrangement of rings directly underneath the fuselage. That small size makes it a perfect fit for cramped, high speed flights. All this -- and MORE in today's episode of Airborne-Unmanned!!!

Airborne-Unmanned 08.30.22 is chock full of info in this Weekly News Episode, Tuesday, August 30th, 2022... 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:

• Airbus Zephyr Falls Short of Endurance Record
• Bristow Group Orders 55 Alia-250 eVTOL Aircraft
• DJI Unveils the Compact, High Speed Avata 
• ASTM Vertiport, Vertistop Standards Unveiled
• MQ-8 Fire Scout Demonstration Successful
• 25th SpaceX Dragon Flight Completed as Capsule Splashes Down
• New Shepard’s 23rd Flight Imminent 

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-Unmanned" here on Aero-TV. Thanks for watching. See you, again, next week!

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