Boeing's Egg-Shaped Hydrogen Spy Plane Flies for Four Days [Planes]

This is Boeing's "Phantom Eye," a hydrogen-powered, unmanned spy plane that flies 65,000 feet above the ground and can fly for four days straight. Boeing hails it as the "first of its kind" — its looks alone set it apart for that honor.

[DVICE]

The insane plan to convert dead airliners into hydrofoils [Recycle]

Instead of putting old airliners out to pasture to rot in some cockroach corner, Hydro Lance wants to substitute pontoons for wings, and blast those Boeing 727s across the high seas. The company says it'll cost about million to buy one of the decommissioned jets, and then once things get rolling, an additional million to convert it to one of these jet-propelled ferries that can go 161mph.

It all sounds so simple. The idea is to leave the three engines located near the tail section intact, and use the existing cargo areas and seating for passengers, and use the existing cockpit controls to steer this seafaring rocket full of passengers on a 'glass smooth' ride from here to there. How will these flightless jets skim across the waves? Why, they'll use the company's HARTH float pontoons, of course. Insert miracle here.

The company's not saying anything about how those jet engines would react to ingesting salt water. If they would've had a fleet of these ready last week, those poor souls marooned by the volcano would've had a great way to escape their predicament.

[DVICE via Hydro Lance via Jalopnik]

UPDATE: Boeing 787 Dreamliner takes off on first flight

Can the first airliner built of mostly plastic actually fly? The weather was good enough today in Everett, Washington for the twin-engine Boeing 787 Dreamliner to take off for the first time. The 210-330-passenger began its historic maiden voyage, 1:26 PM Eastern Time — in the classic airline tradition, it was almost a half hour later than scheduled.
Looks like fun. The webcast features a flight tracker, a map showing the location of the webcast's viewers, and control room messages throughout the five-hour flight between Everett, Washington and Boeing's Seattle facility. You can also hear the pilots talking with air traffic control.



Why should we care? 50% of this plastic plane is made of carbon fiber-reinforced plastic, and 15% of it is made of aluminum, making it a lot lighter than other airplanes, giving it 20% better fuel efficiency than comparably sized planes. It's not sacrificing speed for efficiency — it zips along at the same speeds as today's fastest airliners, Mach 0.85, or around 647mph. Delayed for two years because of a variety of problems, thank goodness this crate got off the ground without a hitch.
[DVICE via 787 First Flight]

Boeing kills things on the ground with lasers

Well, it’s not exactly a surprise, as they’ve been working on it for years, but Boeing just had a successful firing of their aircraft based military laser. So successful in fact, they managed to blow something up.
While not exactly portable (it’s mounted in a C-130) the laser certainly is powerful. The chemical laser consumes as much energy in a 5 second burst as is needed to power an american household for an hour. That’s a whole lot of pew-pew. The system has been in development since 2008, at a cost of approximately $30 million. Good to see that it’s finally been successful.
I wonder if you can use it to make popcorn.