Daily fact about experimental flight test, test pilots, flight test engineers, and flight related applications of engineering and mathematics by @markjonesjr
Joined December 2010
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"A superior pilot uses his superior judgement to avoid situations which require the use of his superior skill" (Frank Borman). #avgeek
👇🏼
@unmanndairspace @ButterworthHay
I just want to tell you that you are doing a fantastic job with Urban Air mobility news. It's one of the few sites that I've followed for years with my Feedly. Keep up the great work.
Flight Test Fact retweeted
"At that time (1909) the chief engineer was almost always the chief test pilot as well. That had the fortunate result of eliminating poor engineering early in aviation" (Igor Sikorsky).
H/T @david
Flight Test Fact retweeted
About 18 months after XB-1's last test flight, the team is back in a control room getting ready for our next big test event.
They're all pretty happy it's *not* in the Mojave desert this time.
Beautiful photographs of the Bell X-1 by the National Air Space Smithsonian
airandspace.si.edu/collectio…
#flighttest
In celebration of supersonic flight test, read the latest Flight Test Safety Fact here:
flighttestfact.com/flight-te…
Happy break the sound barrier day to those who celebrate!
On Oct 14, 1947, Yeager piloted Glamorous Glennis, a flight test orange airplane, to supersonic speeds.
youtu.be/V8p5N0k3eC4
#flighttest
Happy break the sound barrier day to those who celebrate!
On Oct 14, 1947, Yeager piloted Glamorous Glennis, a flight test orange airplane, to supersonic speeds.
youtu.be/V8p5N0k3eC4
#flighttest
10/7/1932 First flight #flighttest of the Stipa Caproni "flying barrel" ducted fan test bed
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stipa-…
| Primer vuelo del Stipa Caproni fue el 10/7/1932 via @josemanzella
100 years after the first successful circumnavigation of the world by airplane, SpaceX demonstrates successful orbits of its Starship. Wow
Wow.
spacex.com/launches/starship…
#flighttest
Bye Aerospace’s all-electric EFlyer2 makes first flight, in Colorado on 20260924
#flighttest
urbanairmobilitynews.com/fix…
Flight Test Fact retweeted
Read full press release here: regentcraft.com/news/regent-…
Strictly speaking, entropy has increased everywhere, which is also "objectively worse."
But that doesn't mean a lot of things aren't much, much better.
Not meaning to complain too much, but... I've just had this overwhelming feeling lately that so many things are objectively WORSE in 2026 than they were say 7 years ago. Here's a short list of things:
1. Google. I no longer get anywhere near an honest search, mostly either AI or ads
2. YouTube, search is also completely broken, serving only recent things and / or shorts. I guess social media in general just feels more and more pointless and far less about humans.
3. Uber / Lyft, prices are INSANE
4. DoorDash, prices are also absolutely off the charts
5. Rental cars, needed to rent a car yesterday, couldn't do it under a few hundred for 2 days.
6. Groceries are almost $200 every time I go
7. Insurance has sky rocketed for everything. The house in Texas is about 2 times more expensive to insure in 2026 than it was in just 2021
8. Food. Starbucks and Subway sandwiches were never particularly amazing, but now they're not even a shell of what they used to be, and many many others.
9. Online ordering. I feel like I used to kind of know what I'd get. Now there's a decent chance of seeing some AI slop and getting a complete scam of a product with no responsibility
10. Phones. I'm less happy with my phone and getting more and more spam calls now more than ever, and I'm more often either waiting for faceID to work, or accidentally hitting something, or accidentally hitting the camera button, or accidentally changing the background. Like multiple times a day, I'm doing an input that I did not want to do. That didn't used to happen
11. Housing / Rent prices / hotel prices
12. EVERYTHING being "private equity", screw that. Stop chasing profit, chase making good products.
I guess a lot of this is just inflation in general. I'm really noticing the price of things get more and more ridiculous...
But it also feels like a lot of things are just getting worse. Adding features that shouldn't exist, chasing profits over making a good product, adding steps to make something more frustrating to use or order or do. Trying to have AI just simply "replace" something instead of being a tool to help improve it, or a way to just opt back.
I don't know. I'm trying hard to just keep my head down and do my work the old fashioned way, and I just feel like there's this mantra of "hurry up or you'll miss out". I've been enjoying being outside more, trying to be healthy and offline, and it just feels more and more like things aren't what it used to be.
I say this, yet I'm still hopeful for the future. I still think there's incredible things happening and amazing technologies, and exciting things happening in our world. I just feel like if I could hit the rewind button on a few things, I absolutely would. Would you? Maybe this is just part of growing older and feeling nostalgic? I am getting old...
That's way up there!
25 years ago on Aug 13, 2001, the experimental Helios Prototype—a solar-powered, remotely-piloted aircraft developed under NASA's ERAST program—reached an altitude of 96,863 feet (29,524 m), achieving a world altitude record for sustained horizontal flight by a winged, propeller-driven aircraft.
At this altitude, the air's density is less than 2% that at sea level.
ALT The U-shaped solar-electric Helios Prototype flying wing is shown near the Hawaiian island of Niihau during its first test flight on solar power from the U.S. Navy's Pacific Missile Range Facility on Kauai, Hawaii, July 14, 2001. This was a functional checkout of the aircraft's systems and performance in preparation for its attempt to reach sustained flight at 100,000 feet altitude in August of that year
A child will learn
the words to say
before he learns
the letter "a".
Similarly...
Our heads will learn
each piece and part
of those things that
we know by heart.
#grooks
With a link to a free digital copy of this antique book
The absolute BEST and WORST of AI applied to #flighttest and hearts and minds.
flighttestfact.com/flight-te…
It's like a carnival for your brain!
Includes a vignette about the B-52 crash
A take you wouldn't expect--one you should read!
Yes, an AI video appears in this month's "flight test safety" newsletter...
cc @heavypulp
Yes, an AI video appears in this month's "flight test safety" newsletter...
cc @heavypulp
@heavypulp I loved Sweet Land. The video. The song. The AI. The non AI.
I loved it so much that I shared it with 2000+ flight test professionals--test pilots and engineers--in the latest Flight Test Safety Committee, SETP, SFTE newsletter here:
flighttestfact.com/flight-te…