Aviation

Rocket Lab Founder Peter Beck Finds Pure Joy During First Jetson One Flight Over California

By Jackson Chung November 1, 2026

Sir Peter Beck stepped into the open cockpit of a Jetson One on a California field and rose into the air with little more than a single four-axis joystick in his hand. The founder and chief executive of Rocket Lab, the man who built the Electron rocket that has flown dozens of successful missions and who is now developing the larger Neutron vehicle, had come for a test hop in the single-seat electric aircraft. What followed was a short, controlled flight that left him calling the experience a revelation.

Electra EL2 Hybrid-Electric Demonstrator Completes First Fixed Wing Takeoff and Landing at Manhattan Heliport

By Jackson Chung November 1, 2026

On the morning of October 26, 2026, Electra’s yellow two-seat EL2 hybrid-electric demonstrator rolled onto the pad at Downtown Skyport on Pier 6 in the East River and lifted off again after a brief ground run, the first time a fixed-wing airplane without any ability to hover had operated from that Lower Manhattan heliport. The 62-by-62-foot landing area sits on a roughly 300-foot barge that has served helicopters since 1960. Conventional airplanes need far more pavement, so the site had remained off-limits to them. Electra’s team treated the existing surface as sufficient.

YIVTOL S-Zero Plus Brings Single-Seat Electric Vertical Flight Within Reach of Private Owners

By Bill Smith October 28, 2026

Early buyers in the United States and Europe have already begun taking delivery of the YIVTOL S-Zero Plus, a single-seat electric multicopter that lifts off vertically from a backyard or open field without needing a runway or a pilot license in qualifying cases. Built by Shenzhen Yingwu Intelligent Technologies under the YIVTOL name, the aircraft hangs a compact carbon-fiber cockpit beneath a titanium-tube frame that supports eight independent electric rotors arranged in a four-axis coaxial layout. Arms fold inward so the whole machine can shrink enough to fit in a pickup bed or a standard garage bay, turning storage and transport into ordinary logistics rather than a specialized operation.

Gravity Industries Jet Suit Takes Flight Over Eden Project Grounds in Cornwall

By Bill Smith October 26, 2026

Richard Browning took off from the grassy stretch outside the Eden Project’s famed biomes on a beautiful late March morning, the engines roaring to life as they have every time he has flown one of these. This time, he was demonstrating the Jet Suit at Anthropy UK, a gathering of movers and shakers in Cornwall. As the creator of Gravity Industries and the suit’s chief pilot, he intended to give everyone a taste of what personal flight is like when the engines roar, movement is instinctive, and the crowd feels the blast of exhaust in their face.

Anthony Toth Spent Decades Recreating a Perfect 1970s Pan Am 747 Cabin Right Down to the Peanuts

By Bill Smith October 25, 2026

Photo credit: Coolest Thing
A five-year-old boy stepped onto a Pan Am Boeing 747 bound for Europe to visit his grandparents and never quite left that cabin in his mind. Anthony Toth, raised near Cleveland Hopkins International Airport in Cuyahoga Falls, Ohio, began photographing interiors, collecting anything with the blue logo, and building wooden mockups in his parents’ basement by the time he turned twelve.

Jetson One Named Astro Becomes First Flying Police Vehicle at Florida Polytechnic University

By Bill Smith October 23, 2026

Florida Polytechnic University’s police department took delivery of a single-seat electric aircraft this summer and painted it in school colors with “Police” markings along the frame. Officers, including Chief Aaron Murray, completed training on the machine, which carries the registration N911FP and the nickname Astro. The name nods both to astronomy and to the dog that flew around in the old Jetsons cartoons.

Alef Aeronautics Celebrates Thousandth Logged Flight Over Tesla Roadster

By Bill Smith October 17, 2026

Alef Aeronautics released video on Thursday of its electric flying car lifting off vertically and crossing above a Tesla Roadster, marking the California company’s 1,000th logged flight. The clip arrived the same day Tesla showed its redesigned Roadster performing a brief airborne hop with cold-gas thrusters at a SpaceX site in Texas. In the Alef footage the vehicle rises cleanly, maintains a level cabin, and glides over the Roadster along with a Cybertruck and other cars parked nearby.

DeLorean Airspeeder Team Brings American Icon to Electric Flying Car Racing

By Jackson Chung October 16, 2026

DeLorean Motor Company announced this week at TechCrunch Disrupt in San Francisco that it will enter the Airspeeder International Series as constructor of the United States team. The new DeLorean Airspeeder Team becomes the first American constructor in the championship and is scheduled to make its race debut when the 2026–27 season opens in November.

Airbus U740 Valkyrie Completes Maiden Flight as European Loyal Wingman Program Advances

By Jackson Chung October 16, 2026

Airbus and Kratos completed the first flight of the U740 Valkyrie on October 12, 2026, from a test facility in Northern Europe, confirming the program remains on schedule for a combat ready collaborative combat aircraft by 2029. The aircraft lifted off with rocket assistance that removed any need for a runway, then performed maneuvers at several altitudes while reaching speeds up to Mach 0.8 and accepting changes to its mission plan in the air. All planned objectives were met on this initial European sortie, which used an airframe already proven in American testing since the XQ-58A first flew in 2019.

FlyWithRookie’s Fully Enclosed Boeing 737NG Home Flight Simulator Puts a Line Jet Behind a Locking Door

By Bill Smith September 24, 2026

FlyWithRookie streams from a Boeing 737NG flight deck that occupies a room the way a real jet occupies a hangar. Flight Deck Solutions in Canada supplied the fixed-base trainer, mixing replica hardware with real aircraft parts from the shell inward, and the result includes circuit breaker walls, a crew jumpseat, a working cockpit door that latches, and a custom galley aft of the flight deck. He has said there is nothing more satisfying than pressing TOGA and watching a real-world throttle walk forward as the jet builds toward V1, rotate, and V2.