Ooo, cool!: https://www.cnn.com/travel/jetzero-pathfinder-subscale-demonstrator/index.html
It’s a 1/8 scale “something”. Can’t get any real info on it. Is it a radio controlled drone?
This is the company site: JetZero. USAF has had the hots for a blended wing-body airplane for years. They hired these guys to actually build some subscale demonstrators and the plan is to scale them up to real.
So yeah, what’s being built is an overgrown RC model. But the hope is real quick that e.g. 20’ wingspan turns into 200’.
Another day, another unruly passenger arrest
I saw that. It looked like a advertisement for investors. Where’s the model that got approval to fly?
And another day, another exciting event, although in this case it almost happened last week:
The article has a nice overhead shot of LGA as it looked a few years ago. The terminals are a good bit different now, but the runways, taxiways, and control tower are unchanged.
Piecing together the narratives, it seems they were trying to land from left to right on the runway (22) near the foreground from that pic’s POV, and somehow ended up offset laterally well to their left = the east and came kinda close to joining the control tower. Which would have sucked mightily for a lot of people.
In more whining from me about stock photos, farther down you see a pic of a bunch of people in a windowed room facing computer screens. Meanwhile the text is going on about FAA tower controller staffing and meanwhile you might wonder how those folks could control anything since they can’t really see outside through all the computer screens in front of their faces.
That pic is actually part of AA’s hub control center at Charlotte Douglas airport in North Carolina. Those people work for AA, not FAA. Their job is to manage the flow of catering, fuel, cargo, baggage, maintenance, etc. to the gates. Each one of those folks is managing a dozen or 15 gates. Which they watch on CCTV, not looking out the window. There are other AA employees in that building with more windows and fewer computer screens in the way who manage the pushing out, docking in, and taxiing of airplanes on the AA-controlled ramp areas.
Stock photo of a competitor airline for the win!
I think that airlines should get together and ban people like her for the safety of passengers and crews.
“Airlines get together to …” = Illegal under antitrust laws.
The airlines and their joint lobbying group A4A, and the various major crew unions, have been lobbying Congress to create a national unruly banned passenger list to achieve what you’re asking for. The effort has been ongoing for over 20 years now, but really picked up speed when some combo of politics and COVID created a lot more unruly passengers seemingly devoid of any self-control or common sense.
Congress has so far turned a deaf ear to this chorus. Write your congressperson. It can’t hurt.
Or re-regulate so that flying is more expensive, airlines would have to compete on amenities instead of price, and fewer yahoos would be flying. (And maybe… maybe… people would dress better.)
last unruly example was first class, so there flies your reasoning … 
but I get what you are trying to say … unwashed masses and all
I understand there are certain “standard flights” that are universally hated by staff — friday late afternoon flights out of mining locations come to mind …
the insiders can probably spill the beans on that topic
There should certainly either be a national banned-passenger list, or an exemption to the Sherman Antitrust Act to allow the airlines to cooperate on that issue.
But surely they should have said “An engine on a Boeing 737…”, since if something goes wrong on an airplane the general public now believes it’s all Boeing’s fault!
Because we all know that a better class of people is always the wealthy class of people.
Flying is uncomfortable at best. Even in first I’m wearing my most comfy clothes, which is not suit and tie. Sweat pants or shorts depending on destination, sneaks, comfy shirt, probably compression socks. In fact, I’m heading north Sunday, and that’s what I’ll be wearing (sweats–going to Terrace BC. Not shorts).
I’ve never understood the “problem” of people dressing down to fly. Apart from a garment with an overtly unkind message (which would anger me anywhere and I’ve only rarely encountered in the wild), I can’t imagine being bothered by someone’s clothes. Be comfortable. Suits and ties are stupid, performative, and contribute nothing (as the non-wearer) to my experience as a passenger. If you like 'em, wear 'em. But I won’t. Similarly, wear sweats, a bikini or a gorilla suit for all I care.
From the flight crew member side of things, I think we’ve made an absurd fetish out of uniforms. Yes, crew need to be recognizable. But some companies blow this way out of proportion by fixating on “how well” you wear your uniform:
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For Og’s sake, you MUST wear a tie! And right after we give you a breakaway ID lanyard so nobody can grab you with it, we’ll issue you a full, mandatory necktie. I’ve seen at least one study that suggests neckties increase fatigue, but formality is much more important apparently. So far, not one company has issued me a clip-on.
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Do you have your wings pinned to your shirt? The ones that are pointy and jab you under your jacket? And catch on your headset wire? And make holes in your shirt, unless you have the unsightly pilot shirts with pre-made holes? Oh, and unless you work for JetBlue or a handful of other companies, the shirts will be white and therefore challenging to keep clean during your work rotation - which, depending on where you work, could be weeks at a time.
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What about your blazer? The one that you’re supposed to wear all the time, even in summer, which also takes up a lot of luggage space when you’re not wearing it. I’ve flat out refused to ever wear one. There are two or three still in my closet.
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Hey, we’ll even base some security procedures on whether or not you’re wearing your uniform. Doesn’t matter that it’s your several IDs (based on serious background checks) that really matter, and that pilot uniforms aren’t controlled equipment and anyone can buy them.
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“At our airline it is absolutely forbidden to be out of uniform when on duty.” Except when it suits the company. One time enough people were out sick that we ran out of captains. Then it turned out one was traveling as a passenger back from vacation and they begged him to fly the leg home. Which he did - in Bermuda shorts and flip-flops. Oddly, he was never disciplined for this.
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Lastly, I’ve known a few too many people, both in and out of aviation, who could wear a uniform acceptably, but had no other competencies.
At least they didn’t screw that up. What I find annoying about the article is no mention of whether the issue as at start-up, during taxi, or during take-off. Big difference in the consequence profile of each of those.
Even the fire dept could not bring themselves to say what really happened. “… there was a fire in one of the two engines that needed to be extinguished.”. By who? The FD, or the pilots using the airplane’s extinguisher? Big difference. Gaah!!!
People used to dress up to fly because it was an indication of the occasion. Flying was a sophisticated form of travel. A well dressed person was also a well behaved person. Times have changed and it isn’t the lack of an unofficial dress code. It’s lack of civility. People dressed their best because it followed their behavior. Not the other way around.
Fun comedy clip from a couple years ago. Surely exaggerated, but grains of truth to the episode (supposedly unreliable fuel gauge plus challenging weather and visibility at primary destination contribute to a bumpy landing):
This is R/C, but I had to share it. A guy spent two years building a true-to-scale Bentley rotary aircraft engine, and then spent another two years building a 27% scale Avro 504K to put it on. Here’s a video.
I think a lot of people today don’t know what a rotary engine is, unless it’s in a Mazda. Everyone knows that engines have blocks and cylinders, and the crankshaft spins around inside. While a rotary engine might look like a radial engine, it works the opposite way. The crankshaft is fixed, and the cylinders rotate around it with the propeller fixed to the block.
ETA: The text from the post where I got the video:
Andy Johnston must take his RC modeling very seriously … why else would he spend over 3 years building a true-to-scale, rotary Bentley engine spending another 2 years building an Avro 504K from plans, specifically for the engine? The 9-cylinder powerplant has cast-iron liners that are 1mm thick, aluminum finned barrels and a total of 347cc displacement for a range of 700 to 3500rpm with a 25.5 x 23 prop that has a scale blade shape. The engine spins, just like its full-size counterpart! The Avro 504K is enlarged to 27% scale from 1/4-scale David Boddington plans and has a 116-inch wingspan. It is covered in linen Solartex and has freehand markings. Andy notes, “The Avro was designed around the Bentley with the provision for exchanging it for a Zenoah 62. There are no noticeable effects of gyroscopic precession from the rotating Bentley affecting the handling unduly, just a slight difference in left and right which may be due to torque and the coarse-pitch propeller. Twenty-two flights with Bentley to date.”