Model Airplanes

MOJAVE — The Mojave Air and Space Port is world-renowned for the innovative aircraft that have been designed, built and tested there, whether by companies such as Scaled Composites or by myriad individuals working in their hangars on their own.

The annual Mojave Experimental Fly-in is an opportunity to celebrate that spirit, as the airport wel­comes these imaginative people who create air­craft of every imaginable shape, size and type, from air racers to comfortable cruis­ers, radio-controlled models to balsa-wood fliers.

On April 12 and 13, the seventh edition of the event brought out a somewhat smaller crowd, with 161 airplanes flying in to take part. But the opportunity to share projects and ideas remained the same.

In a larger-than-life example of that innovative spirit, Saturday morning saw the first flight of the world’s biggest airplane, built by Scaled Composites for Stratolaunch Systems.

The twin-fuselage behemoth took to the skies above the Mojave Air and Space Port a few hours before the start of the fly-in festivities, rolling to a stop across the field from the display area about the time aircraft were arriving to participate.

Several planes that had arrived the day before were already arrayed on the flightline, where a small and appreciative crowd gathered to witness the milestone flight.

The maiden voyage of the airplane, developed to be used as an aerial launch platform to rocket small payloads such as satellites into orbit, was an unexpected added attraction, but it also upended some of the plans for the event. The planned flour bomb contest,

Article source: https://www.avpress.com/flights-of-fancy/article_1c1a4930-619a-11e9-af41-43ee716006f5.html

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Article source: https://www.avweb.com/avwebflash/newthisweek/Industry-Round-up-April-19-2019-232669-1.html

The travel journalist Paula Froelich remembers walking onto her first Virgin America flight and thinking, “What is this, a club?” When the airline launched in the US in 2007, industrial designer Adam Wells decided to avoid the sickly “yellow-green fluorescent lighting” standard on planes in favor of warm, pinkish-purple mood lighting, already a feature in Virgin Atlantic’s first class cabin. The goal was to make the often stressful experience of air travel more welcoming and relaxing — and possibly even pleasant.

Calming, perhaps, but still clubby. Froelich was skeptical of Virgin America’s apparent intention to make airplanes cool, but says that with its comfortable seats and individual screens, “It was just a nice experience. For a lot of people, flying is not a nice experience.”

More than a decade later, Alaska Airlines has acquired Virgin America and set about scrubbing the branding from its airplanes, but the legacy of Virgin’s mood lighting lives on in a number of US airlines, many of which have focused their light color schemes on shades of blue. The color has a number of advantages in this

Article source: https://www.vox.com/the-goods/2019/4/19/18485015/airplane-blue-lighting-delta-jetblue-united

The FAA on Thursday issued an emergency airworthiness directive (2019-08-51) against the Cirrus SF50 Vision Jet that grounds the entire fleet until specified maintenance is performed on the aircraft’s angle of attack indicators.

The AD was prompted by three incidents on Cirrus Model SF50 airplanes of the stall warning and protection system (SWPS) or electronic stability and protection (ESP) system engaging when not appropriate, with the first incident occurring in November and the latest this month.

The agency said, “The noted condition presents an immediate danger to pilots and passengers of Cirrus Design Corporation Model SF50 airplanes because an uncommanded pitch down may be difficult to recover from in some flight regimes with potentially fatal consequences. The before-further-flight compliance time and need to replace the AOA sensors due to the potentially fatal consequences does not allow for prior notice and opportunity to comment for the public.”

The AD explained that the “SWPS or ESP systems may engage even when sufficient airspeed and proper angle of attack (AOA) exists for normal flight. The SWPS includes the stall warning alarm, stick shaker and stick pusher.

The Garmin-designed ESP includes under speed protection (USP). The SWPS system engaging inappropriately could potentially result in a stall warning crew alert message activation, accompanied by an audio alarm and stick shaker activation, followed possibly by either low-speed ESP/USP engaging and/or the stick pusher engaging. “The pilot will also observe the dynamic and color-coded (Red) airspeed awareness ranges displaying the stall band, regardless of actual indicated airspeed,” the FAA noted.

Article source: https://www.flyingmag.com/faa-grounds-cirrus-vision-jets