Aviation Features

Also known as amateur-built aircraft or kit planes, homebuilt aircraft are constructed by persons for whom this is not a professional activity. These aircraft may be constructed from “scratch,” from plans, or from assembly kits. […]

Twelve O’Clock High is a 1949 war film about crews of the United States Army’s Eighth Air Force who flew daylight bombing missions against Nazi Germany and occupied France during the early days of American involvement in World War II. […]

Eighteen test vehicles, more than 5,000 sorties, and 10,000 flight test hours are just a few ways to sum up the testing planned for the System Development and Demonstration, or SDD, phase of the F-35 program. […]

The Stinson 108 was a popular general aviation aircraft produced by the American airplane company Consolidated Vultee, from immediately after World War II to 1950, when the company was bought by Piper Aircraft. Production continued for a few years under Piper. […]

On December 17, 2003, this nation celebrated the first century of flight at Kitty Hawk, North Carolina. The day’s events commemorated the accomplishments of Wilbur and Orville Wright, and the century of aerospace achievements they launched. […]

All F-16s are not created equal. Fighting Falcons rolling out of the factory today are nothing like earlier versions. […]

Sixty-one years after a sonic boom first rolled across the roof of the high desert in southern California, there are still things yet to be discovered about supersonic flight. […]

The Lockheed U-2, nicknamed Dragon Lady, is a single-engine, high-altitude aircraft flown by the United States Air Force and previously flown by the Central Intelligence Agency. […]

Organization of the U.S. Air Force World War II had been over for two years and the Korean War lay three years ahead when the Air Force ended a 40-year association with the U.S. Army to become a separate service. […]

TOPGUN is the popular name of the United States Navy Strike Fighter Tactics Instructor (SFTI) program. SFTI is the modern-day evolution of the United States Navy Fighter Weapons School and carries out the same specialized fighter training as NFWS had from 1969 until 1996, when it was merged into the Naval Strike and Air Warfare Center at NAS Fallon, Nevada. […]