Having already spoken on NASA’s activities with Lockheed-Martin, Boeing, and Northrop Grumman recently, NASA have released further information on their N+3 and N+4 prototypes and technologies (the term ‘N+3’, denoting three generations beyond the current commercial transport fleet). Phase one of the N+3 concepts were completed in 2010, and have been used as a bed [...]

Consider the changes undergone in aviation since the commercial use of jet aircraft began at the end of the 1950’s, and it is easy to see the progression in aircraft shape and design, let alone fuel efficiency. Today jet aircraft are over 70% more fuel efficient per seat kilometre than those of the 1960’s, and [...]

The name Lockheed has not been heard in relation to commercial passenger aircraft for some time. Their last passenger aircraft, the L1011 TriStar, ended production in 1984 and the company, now called Lockheed Martin, has since focused on the military (although it does provide many civil transport systems and components). It was interesting, therefore to [...]

I have just returned from Montreal, where I met with a number of colleagues from across the aviation sector at the ICAO Environment Colloquium. Hélène Gagnon, one of our Board members from airframe manufacturer Bombardier, explains about the colloquium in this video: Hélène mentions our industry targets and goals in that video. One of them, [...]

From the enticingly-named Boeing "Phantom Works" team we learn of some work being carried out on a new type of aircraft fuselage – the so-called "blended wing". It’s probably easier to show you what it looks like rather than try to describe it: This is one of the first operational prototype aircraft in an entirely [...]

Today, we have news of a number of different projects underway encompassing many parts of the aviation industry, across a number of countries. I decided to put them all into one post, because this really illustrates the coordinated and cooperative nature of aviation – we work best when we work together, both on a day-to-day [...]

The race to the White House is not the only race making news at the moment. Last week, I wrote about some of the work being done on a new type of very efficient aircraft engine by Rolls-Royce. Well, it seems that GE Aviation have teamed up with NASA to run similar tests, according to [...]