Today's Aerospace Pulse
Blue Origin’s New Glenn suffers catastrophic engine failure during static fire
A BE‑4 methane/LOX engine on Blue Origin’s New Glenn rocket failed four seconds after ignition, causing a catastrophic explosion that destroyed the first‑stage booster and damaged Launch Complex 36A. No personnel were injured. An FAA‑led investigation, supported by the U.S. Space Force, is under way.
Also developing:
By the numbers: Disciplined Growth Acquisition Corp raises $150M in IPO
AvTalk Episode 367: We’re Worried About Availability, Not Just Cost
In this episode, hosts Ian Pechnick and Jason Rabinowitz discuss recent near‑miss incidents at JFK, Nashville, and Bogota, highlighting the crucial role of TCAS and ATC procedures in preventing collisions. They then shift to a broader industry challenge: jet‑fuel scarcity and price spikes caused by Middle‑East tensions, especially the blockage of the Strait of Hormuz, and examine Europe’s non‑binding Accelerate EU plan to coordinate fuel supplies. The conversation culminates with Lufthansa’s rapid response—shutting down its City Line subsidiary, retiring A340‑600s and two 747‑400s, and cutting a small slice of its summer schedule—illustrating how airlines are forced to act on availability, not just cost. Guest Steve Fox (NATS Director of Operations Control) provides insight into how the UK’s air navigation provider prepares for a near‑pre‑pandemic summer traffic surge, emphasizing early planning and capacity management.
Abu Dhabi Was a Mistake — Wizz Air’s CEO Says He’ll Make More
Wizz Air’s joint‑venture in Abu Dhabi, launched in 2019 with sovereign‑wealth fund ADQ, was shut down last summer after the airline hit unexpected operational and regulatory hurdles. CEO József Váradi admitted the move was a mistake, citing especially the Pratt & Whitney GTF engine...
NASA Completes Roman Space Telescope, Prepares for Launch to Map Dark Energy and Exoplanets
NASA has finished building the Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope at Goddard Space Flight Center and is ready to ship it to Kennedy Space Center for launch. The 40‑foot infrared observatory will conduct wide‑field surveys to probe dark energy, dark...
SkyDrive and West Nippon Expressway Form AAM Partnership
SkyDrive Inc. has partnered with West Nippon Expressway Company (NEXCO West) to explore commercial eVTOL services using the expressway’s parking and service areas as vertiport sites. The collaboration will assess feasibility of turning these waystations into air‑mobility hubs, supporting SkyDrive’s...
New Routes and More Flights From Avianca This Summer
Avianca is boosting its U.S. network for Summer 2026 by adding 42 weekly flights, expanding capacity on existing routes and launching new services. The carrier will debut a nonstop San Francisco‑Guatemala City flight in June and resume several seasonal routes such...
Egypt Launches Green Aviation Strategy, Engages Advisors for SAF and Digital Overhaul
Egypt’s civil aviation ministry announced a comprehensive green aviation roadmap that adds 34 new aircraft, builds a solar‑powered Terminal 4, studies domestic SAF production and rolls out a digital passport system. Officials said external advisory support will be key to delivering...
U.S. Reopens 2022 Death of Army Biochemist Amid Probe of Missing Defense Researchers
The Pentagon and federal investigators have reopened the 2022 accidental death of Jude Height, a 71‑year‑old Army biochemist, as part of a broader probe into at least a dozen unexplained deaths and disappearances of scientists linked to nuclear, aerospace and...
Artemis II Validates Orion Heat Shield, Feeds $20 B Moon‑base Plan and Flags Toilet Glitch
NASA’s Artemis II crew returned safely after a 10‑day lunar flyby, proving the Orion heat shield performed as expected and delivering observations that shape a $20 billion moon‑base concept. The mission also exposed a clogged urine‑vent line in the new 3‑D‑printed titanium...
Australia Awards Contracts for Counter-Drone Tech Based on Lasers, Interceptors
Australian Defence Minister Pat Conroy announced a A$7 bn ($5 bn) investment to double funding for counter‑drone defenses. As part of the Integrated Investment Program, AIM Defence received a A$21.3 m ($15 m) contract to enhance its Fractl high‑energy laser, while Sypaq Systems was...
Geosky Airlines Begins China-Denmark Freighter Flights
Geosky Airlines, a Georgian cargo carrier, has launched regular freighter services linking Xi’an, China, with Copenhagen, Denmark, via a stop in Tbilisi, Georgia. The route is operated with Boeing 767‑300 passenger‑to‑freighter aircraft and expands Geosky’s network that already reaches 66...
Bundeswehr Launches Loitering Munition Spending Spree with $2.16 Billion Unassigned
Germany’s Bundeswehr has opened a €2.4 billion (≈US$2.75 billion) framework for loitering‑munition systems, kicking off with a €300 million (US$344 million) contract to Rheinmetall for its FV‑014 autonomous reconnaissance‑strike drone. The deal, delayed for months, schedules qualification in Q2 2026 and initial deliveries in the...
Braving the Arctic for Upcoming Polar-Focused Satellites
The European Space Agency is preparing three new Copernicus satellites—CIMR, CRISTAL and ROSE‑L—to improve Arctic sea‑ice monitoring. To validate the instruments, an international team is conducting a six‑week field campaign on the sea ice near Cambridge Bay, collecting coordinated ground‑based...
The Pentagon’s $54 Billion Bet on Autonomous Warfare
The Pentagon’s FY2027 budget proposes $54.6 billion—about 15% of the total defense spend—to expand the Departmental Autonomous Warfighting Group (DAWG) by over 24,000%, aiming to create a new unified combatant command for AI‑driven drones, aircraft and vessels. The move mirrors the...
Fuel Price Hikes Bite Thai AirAsia X Service
Thai AirAsia X is slashing flight frequencies to Tokyo, Osaka, Almaty and Delhi while suspending services to Shanghai and Riyadh until June 30. The airline attributes the cuts to soaring jet‑fuel prices driven by the US‑Israeli war on Iran, which has...
Senators Push 200 New F-15EX Fighter Jets in Bipartisan Bill
Senators Budd and Shaheen introduced a bipartisan three‑bill package that includes the Airpower Acceleration Act, authorizing the purchase of 200 additional F‑15EX fighters and setting a statutory minimum fighter fleet of 1,369 aircraft by 2030 and 1,558 by 2035. The...
Satellite Startup Univity Raises €27m to Throw Its Hat Into the Ring
French satellite startup Univity announced a €27 million ($29 M) Series A round to develop its VLEO‑based 5G constellation, uniSky. The funding, led by Blast and backed by Expansion Capital and Bpifrance’s Deeptech 2030, will finance the uniShape demonstrator – two low‑orbit satellites that...
LISI Aerospace Awarded Aero Excellence Bronze Certification
LISI Aerospace announced that its Saint‑Brieuc facility in Brittany has earned the Aero Excellence Bronze certification, the fifth of the group’s sites to do so. The award, administered by GIFAS and SPACE Aero, gauges organizational maturity and operational performance in...
Pentagon Orders Three New F-35 Test Jets
The Pentagon awarded Lockheed Martin a $177.5 million contract modification to build three new F‑35 flight‑science aircraft—one each of the A, B and C variants. The work, spread across seven sites in the United States, United Kingdom and Denmark, is slated for...
China Unveils a Fixed-Wing Drone Made of Bamboo Fibre Composite Material
China’s International Centre for Bamboo and Rattan, together with Beihang University and Long Bamboo Technology, flew the world’s first fixed‑wing drone built largely from bamboo‑based composite material. The UAV’s fuselage contains over 25% bamboo, achieving a weight reduction of more...
ZeroPol: Towards Circular Manufacturing of Aerospace Components
ZeroPol, a Swiss Innosuisse‑backed flagship project, announced the launch of Best Carbon Footprint Materials—a new generation of bio‑derived epoxy resins, vitrimers and debondable adhesives designed for circular aerospace composites. The initiative includes a full‑scale demonstrator of an aircraft sandwich component...
Bjorn’s Corner: Blended Wing Body Airliners. Part 7
Leeham News continues its deep‑dive into blended wing body (BWB) airliners with Part 7, focusing on the latest flight‑test data from Airbus’s MAVERIC demonstrator. The tests showed a roughly 15% drag reduction compared with a conventional tube‑and‑wing layout, reinforcing claims of...
LOT Defends A220 Order as “Right Market Fit”
LOT Polish Airlines announced a firm order for 40 Airbus A220 jets at the 2025 Paris Airshow, marking the carrier’s first purchase from Airbus. The airline’s chief commercial officer defended the decision at the CAPA Airline Leader Summit, saying the...
India’s Defence Leaders Call for Sovereign Space Capabilities as Warfare Enters New Domain
India’s top defence and space leaders convened at the Indian Defence Space Symposium 2026 in New Delhi, urging the rapid development of sovereign, resilient space capabilities. General Anil Chauhan emphasized distributed, AI‑enabled architectures co‑developed with industry and start‑ups, while DRDO...
People Will Be 'Living and Working' On the Moon in the 2030s, Says Space Tech CEO
Voyager Technologies CEO Dylan Taylor told CNBC’s CONVERGE LIVE that an inflatable lunar habitat could be operational by the end of the 2020s, with a permanent human presence on the Moon emerging in the early 2030s. He highlighted a broader...
SpaceX Just Got Pulled Into the Biggest Weapons Program in U.S. History
SpaceX has been added to a nine‑company consortium tasked with creating the core software for the Golden Dome, the United States' next‑generation missile‑defense system. The program, championed by former President Trump, carries an initial price tag of $175 billion and could...
Xpeng's Bold Leap Into eVTOLs and Humanoid Robots
Macro: Xpeng moving into eVTOLs & humanoid robots. Key: 7k+ orders, late‑26/27 deliveries, robotaxi tests, global push. Risks: certification, execution, capex. Trade: buy on pullbacks. 🚀 — Viktor Kopylov, PhD, CFA More insights: t.me/si14Kopylov
Kepler Communications Company Profile
Kepler Communications launched ten Aether‑series optical relay satellites on a SpaceX Falcon 9 in January 2026, marking the first commercial LEO constellation built for real‑time, SDA‑compatible laser links. In March 2026 the company commissioned 40 NVIDIA Jetson Orin GPUs across the new fleet, creating...
C-130 Hercules Crashed Into Trees Shortly After Takeoff in Colombia, Killing 69: Preliminary Probe Finds
A Colombian Air Force C‑130 Hercules crashed near Puerto Leguizamo on March 23, killing 69 and injuring 57 of the 126 aboard. Preliminary investigators say the aircraft struck three trees within four seconds of takeoff, sending vegetation into two engines and...
Astronaut Christina Koch Captures Earthshine on iPhone From Orion 54,500 Km Away
NASA astronaut Christina Koch recorded a striking Earthshine video on an iPhone aboard the Orion capsule during Artemis II’s second flight day, when the spacecraft was about 54,500 km from Earth. The footage, shared by NASA, underscores how consumer smartphones are becoming...
Earn and Spend Avios on Hawaiian Airlines as It Joins the Oneworld Alliance
Hawaiian Airlines officially joined the oneworld alliance after Alaska Airlines completed its 2024 acquisition, rebranding all flights with Alaska’s IATA codes. The carrier adds new Pacific stops—including Hilo, Rarotonga, Pago Pago and Papeete—to the alliance’s route map. Avios members can now...
CSIS Report Finds U.S. Air‑Defense Munitions Halved After Iran Conflict
A new Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) analysis shows the United States burned through roughly 50% of its Patriot and THAAD interceptor stocks, over 850 Tomahawk cruise missiles and more than 1,000 JASSM missiles during the 39‑day Iran...
SpaceX Adds 24 Starlink Satellites, Nearing 9,000 in Orbit
SpaceX launched a Falcon 9 carrying 24 next‑generation Starlink satellites from Vandenberg Space Force Base on April 22, 2026. The deployment brings the total constellation close to 9,000 satellites and highlights SpaceX’s high‑cadence, reusable launch model that keeps costs low while expanding...
SpaceX Wins $57 Million U.S. Military Contract to Demo Satellite Crosslink Tech
SpaceX secured a $57 million contract from the Space Systems Command to demonstrate Link-182 satellite‑to‑satellite communications, a key step toward the Pentagon’s Golden Dome missile‑defense architecture. The award, due for completion by April 2027, marks a deepening partnership between the commercial launch...
Saddam’s Abandoned 747s Linger as Desert Ghost Fleet
These two Iraqi 747s have been rotting in the Tunisian desert since 1991. Saddam hid them before the Gulf War and they never left. Paint peeling, old livery visible. Absolute ghost fleet.
Iran War Has Drained U.S. Supplies of Critical, Costly Weapons
Since the Iran war began in late February, the United States has fired roughly 1,100 long‑range stealth cruise missiles—almost the entire stockpile—along with more than 1,200 Patriot interceptors and over 1,000 ATACMS and Precision‑Strike missiles. The Pentagon has been forced...
Ontario International Airport Passenger Volumes Rose for 4th Straight Month in March While Freight Shipments Grew by 15%
Ontario International Airport (ONT) recorded 574,819 passengers in March 2026, a 2.7% year‑over‑year increase and the fourth consecutive month of growth. International travel surged 55.2% in March and 58.4% for the first quarter, lifting total Q1 passengers to 1.55 million, 4.1%...
The Pentagon Replicated a Ukrainian-Style Drone Attack in Florida. Now It’s Changing Its Counter-Drone Strategy
In September, the Pentagon’s Joint Interagency Task Force‑401 staged Operation Clear Horizon at Eglin Air Force Base, replicating Ukraine’s "spiderweb" drone swarm attack to evaluate U.S. counter‑UAV tactics. The exercise featured a spectrum of drones—from commercial quadcopters to Group‑3 systems—using...
SkyWest, Inc. Q1 2026 Earnings Call Summary
SkyWest reported Q1 2026 results, highlighting increased production and fleet utilization despite March storms. The airline is moving to an all dual‑class fleet, launching the CRJ450 for United, and has cut total debt by $1 billion since the end of 2022....
Alaska Airlines Strengthens California Connectivity with Inaugural Oakland–San Diego Flights
Alaska Airlines launched four daily, year‑round nonstop flights between Oakland (OAK) and San Diego (SAN), using Embraer E175 aircraft. The inaugural service was celebrated with a ribbon‑cutting ceremony attended by Oakland Mayor Barbara Lee and airline executives. The new route...
The US Airport With The Most Flights In 2026 So Far
Chicago O’Hare International Airport has become the United States’ busiest airport by flight volume, logging 860,015 takeoffs and landings in 2025—a 10.8% increase over 2024. In January 2026 O’Hare recorded 64,695 aircraft operations, surpassing Atlanta’s 61,776. The surge is driven...
Should $500 M Bailout Rescue Spirit’s Repeated Bankruptcy?
$500 million of your money could be headed to an airline that’s gone bankrupt twice 🤔 I really want Spirit to survive — they keep fares honest and the Big Front Seat is legit a steal — but is bailing them...
Air Peace CEO Admits Fear, Trusts only His Airline
CEO Of Nigeria’s Air Peace Claims He’s Scared Of Flying, Only Trusts “His” Airline https://t.co/5afIEStp37
Macron Confirms Fighter Jet Project Still Alive After Merz Talk
Macron says fighter-jet project isn’t dead after talk with Merz https://t.co/Qm0W0hzEAk via @AfPalasciano @mcnienaber https://t.co/2NVhw05taK
One Day Consumed Two Years of U.S. Patriot Missiles
“The U.S produces about 60–65 Patriot missiles per month, that's peanuts. On the first day of the attack on West Asia, they used up as much as they produce in two years.” https://t.co/qRrHSvuZr8
Runway Safety System Failed to Activate Before Fatal Collision
NTSB says runway safety system did not activate before fatal Air Canada Express collision https://t.co/6amoUruiSy
Soyuz Tower Demolished, Repurposed for Maia Rocket
There are reports about the demolition of the service tower at the Soyuz launch pad in Kourou, French Guiana. It looks like this supposed video was badly squeezed horizontally. In 2024, the mothballed facility was re-assigned for the European Maia...
New Visuals Reveal URM-2 and URM-1 Adapters for Angara‑5
Rollout visuals released after today's Angara-1.2 launch, showed the URM-2 booster (bottom left) and an adapter for the core version of the URM-1 (bottom right) all required for the assembly of the Angara-5 variant: https://t.co/yFPl9kzmTN https://t.co/bTcyhQqEUF
SpaceX IPO Poised to Become Record‑high Priced Offering
The SpaceX IPO is coming, and it will be a doozy, a futuristic company (spaceships, satellites and AI), a founder who will keep things interesting (Musk) and a price tag that may make it the most highly priced IPO of...
Senate Subcommittee Schedules NASA FY27 Budget Hearing April 28
The Senate CJS appropriations subcommittee will hold a hearing on NASA's FY27 budget request Tuesday April 28 at 10 am EDT. https://t.co/CMP5Deon36
United's Spotty Wi‑Fi Gets Starlink Upgrade Hope
Apparently @united upgrading WiFi to @Starlink @elonmusk - can’t happen soon enough bc service is spotty to the point of embarrassment; no idea how so many Bay Area tech folks (big users of united) put up with it.