Aircraft

Rolls-Royce and Gulfstream Aerospace have scored a double first as the Gulfstream G700 business jet and two Rolls-Royce Pearl 700 engines made their maiden flights at the same time from Savannah/Hilton Head International Airport.

A super-endurance unmanned aircraft built for year-long flights has completed its maiden run. Built by BAE Systems subsidiary Prismatic, the PHASA-35 took to the air over the Woomera Test Range in Australia for its first fully-integrated flight test.

Another stunning milestone for the Jetman team, as pilot Vince Reffet demonstrates the new ability to take off from the ground, then hit the gas on the carbon jet wing's four turbine engines and soar away into the sky.

This racy-looking 12-rotor coaxial multicopter has been filmed in Croatia pulling extreme rolls and loops, and carrying a human on board. Not at the same time, mind you, but still, to see a drone of this size pulling stunts like this is astonishing.

At this year's Singapore Air Show, Airbus has taken the wraps off its latest Blended Wing Body (BWB) scale model demonstrator aircraft, whose purpose is to study propulsion and other systems for an airframe where the fuselage and wing merge into one.

With the backing of aviation giant Boeing and a pilotless 13-rotor transitioning VTOL airframe from Kitty Hawk, Wisk Aero is preparing to launch an autonomous air taxi service trial on the South island of New Zealand, complete with actual passengers.

It was just last month that Hybrid Air Vehicles announced the planned production version of its Airlander 10 airship. At the time, the company mentioned an optional electric propulsion system – more details on that system have now been released.

Vibration tests are underway on a key component of NASA's X-59 Quiet SuperSonic Technology aircraft that not only gives the pilot a virtual window on the airspace ahead, but also graphical flight data.

Earlier this month, Ehang took to the air with its Autonomous Aerial Vehicle for the first flight in the US. Specs on the 216 two-passenger pilotless air taxi were scant at the time, but let's take a closer look now.

After several delays due to bad weather, Boeing's 777X has successfully completed its maiden flight. On January 25, 2020, the latest version of the 777 family took off from Paine Field in Everett, WA for a three-hour and 51-minute test flight.

Leonardo's Falco Xplorer drone has completed its maiden flight. The largest Remotely-Piloted Air System (RPAS) built by the company, the Falco Xplorer S/N0001 spent 60 minutes flying over the Gulf of Trapani in a dedicated fly zone.

Joby Aviation has been beavering away hammering out the designs and flight dynamics of its awesome-looking tilt-rotor eVTOL for more than 10 years. Now, Joby's got half a billion dollars in the bank thanks to a huge investment led by Toyota.