Plane

Last year we caught wind of an interesting airplane concept called the Flying V. The project has now progressed from renders of a futuristic aircraft to a flight-capable scale model, which was recently shown in action for the very first time.

Otto Aviation claims its bizarre-looking Celera 500L "bullet plane" offers the performance of a small jet using just 1/8th the fuel, for around 1/6th the running costs. The company wants to make private air travel cost as much as an airline ticket.

An electric plane capable of traveling 1,000 km on each charge would be capable of hopping between some pretty exotic destinations. This might sound like a pipe dream, but these distances are firmly in the sights of electric aircraft builders gearing up for test flights within the next few years.

Boeing is lifting another suite of experimental technologies into the air as part of its EcoDemonstrator program. Traveling aboard this time around are 50 projects in all, including ones geared toward smart toilets and others toward improving passengers’ view outside the plane. ​

Aircraft have been known to mess with the clouds as they pass through or over them. A new study has found that planes could be boosting rainfall and snowfall by up to 10 times, and examined the microphysics behind it.

​​The HondaJet is an already impressive piece of aerospace engineering. Now Honda is upping the ante, today announcing the HondaJet Elite, which is claimed to not only fly farther than its competitors, but also fly quieter, with new noise-attenuating technology to keep noise down in the cabin.

​Christiaan van Heijst is an airline pilot with over a decade's experience flying everything from small Turboprops to massive Boeing 747s. He's also a photographer able to capture spectacular images from his privileged perspective at 35,000 ft.

​Pipistrel’s Alpha Electro took to the skies in Australia recently, marking the first time an electric light aircraft was flown in the country. The plane has been designed to be an efficient and cheap pilot training craft and this first flight marks a new frontier for electric aircraft in Australia.

​Back in June, the world’s largest plane emerged from its hangar for the first time. Now the team has crossed another milestone by completing the first round of engine testing, continuing the groundwork needed to get the beast into the air in 2019.

To some people, planes are more than metal tubes full of smelly passengers and cramped seats. French photographer Manolo Chrétien is one of them. His new Nose Art gallery is designed to give people a fresh look at a range of aircraft, from hulking warplanes to the ill-fated Concorde.

There’s a whole world of unconnected people out there, and companies are using satellites, drones or even balloons to beam internet to remote areas. Now Airborne Wireless Network plans to make use of the several thousand commercial aircraft in the sky at any given moment to create a meshed network.

Roaring, million-dollar World War 2 birds, chopped and tuned within an inch of disaster, wing to wing in a 400-plus mph circuit race over the baking Reno desert. New Atlas visits the world's fastest motorsport race, and meets some of its extraordinary characters.