flights

11.22.09

Flight of the Navigator

Humans help endangered cranes find their homes

By Catherine Schwanke Posted 04.10.2009 at 11:12 am 1 Comment

Photographed from an ultra-light plane last December, these whooping cranes are being taught to fly south for the winter. Almost completely wiped out by 1940, there are now 536 known captive and wild whooping cranes in North America. But those raised in captivity will not migrate to warmer climes automatically -- they have to learn the skill.

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READ MORE ABOUT > airplaces, aviation, cranes, flights, GPS, gps navigation systems, may 2009, megapixels, migration, ultralights

A Silent Electric Plane

An electric plane that cruises silently at 70 mph and costs just 70 cents to charge

By Amanda Schupak Posted 12.04.2008 at 12:54 pm 26 Comments

Happy Landings : The builder says his goal was a noiseless plane that would fly as smoothly as a magic carpet. John B. Carnett

In August, at the Experimental Aircraft Association (EAA) AirVenture show in Oshkosh, Wisconsin, Randall Fishman’s ElectraFlyer-C made a virtually silent pass over the audience at a mere 200 feet. What they were seeing (but not hearing) might be the world’s first fully electric-powered airplane—representing, said one EAA official, “a groundbreaking technology that would be aviation’s first true alternative to a fossil-fuel engine.”

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READ MORE ABOUT > alternative energy, December 2008, flights, planes

Why Your Flight Got Canceled

No, it’s not because the airline hates you

By Melinda Wenner Posted 09.17.2008 at 1:56 pm 3 Comments

Last year, U.S. airlines canceled 21,000 flights. Or rather, a small cadre of guys canceled 21,000 flights. Every gate agent reports up the ladder at a given airline to a set of command-center managers. We spoke with a few of the people who make the big decisions to learn what factors influence whether they cancel a flight.

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READ MORE ABOUT > flights, Instant Expert, Instant Expert 2008, Melinda Wenner, October 2008, planes