Introducing the Cirrus Vision SJ50

The Cirrus Design Vision SJ50 (aka Cirrus Jet) made its world debut at Oshkosh today. We were fortunate enough to see it make a low pass along the flightline and land. From my vantage point it looked stable, beautiful and fast. They might have a winner with this one.

I love EAA AirVenture. The Cirrus Vision has only been flying for three weeks and they brought it from Duluth to the show. Cirrus is a company that understands marketing. They know it is critical to get this airplane in front of the largest group of pilots in the world.


The SJ50 will be parked at the Cirrus Design booth for the rest of the show. If you are here, it will be worth a look. Last time they announced something like this it was the SR20, which pretty much single-handily changed the face of General Aviation.


The personal jet is a rapidly emerging market. They have only been talking about personal jets (aka Very Light Jets) for about 3 years. Many companies have entered the race...

Eclipse Personal Jet

PiperJet

Introducing the Martin Jetpack

The Martin Jetpack flew around 9:30 am today at Oshkosh in front of a huge crowd, but sadly it was not Buck Rogers as I hoped. The unit isn't really a jetpack, it has a 200 HP, 2-stroke, Piston Engine that drives two large ducted fans that are enclosed in a carbon fiber shroud.


The company claims that the Jetpack will fly up to 8,000 feet, burn 10.5 GPH, fly at a max of 61 MPH and has a 31.5 mile range although they have only had it 6 feet off of the ground. They were taking orders for the Jetpack at Oshkosh. They said they are pursuing FAA Light Sport Aircraft Certification and are selling it for $100,000. Personally I'd rather have a Cessna Skycatcher :)

Here's a video produced by Airnav that shows the flight at Oshkosh and some video of other test flights performed by the company.

Introducing WhiteKnightTwo

Here's a video produced by AVweb that has some shots of the unavailing of WhiteKnightTwo at Scaled Composites in Mojave on Monday. Burt Rutan, Sir Richard Branson, and Will Whitehorn left for Oshkosh after the unavailing and presented to a standing room only crowd at AirVenture yesterday afternoon.

Rutan said he expects that within his lifetime, tourists will not only be routinely flying into space, they will also be visiting orbiting resort hotels and taking a loop around the moon. Whitehorn said that he plans to fly space trips from many venues besides the New Mexico spaceport now under construction, and he hopes that the first place they will launch from will be Oshkosh -- and Rutan added that he hopes to sell $5 raffle tickets to fill those six seats.

Are you ready for Oshkosh?

I know, I know, it has been a long time since I have posted anything. I've been thinking about flying every day, but doing just about everything else :( Well today I'm shifting back into full-blown aviation mode! My wife and are gathering our gear and heading to EAA AirVenture Oshkosh. We'll be there most of the week.

It should be a good time this year. There are going to be a number of first. One I'm really looking forward to see is "Rocket Man." We've all dreamed of the day when we could be Buck Rogers and strap a rocket-pack on our back and fly away. Yep, that's right. This dream may be a reality. They will be demoing the "Martin Jetpack" on Tuesday at 9:30 am. What is cool about this one is that it will fly for 30 minutes and has a 1000 hour TBO. How cool is that?

The Boeing Dreamlifter will be arriving Monday at 5pm for a 24-hour stop. This colossal modified 747-400 aircraft and is one of only three in the world! The Dreamlifter features a significantly enlarged fuselage allowing it to carry more cargo by volume than any airplane.
Can't wait to see it!


The V-22 ‘Osprey’ Tiltrotor Aircraft will be Coming to EAA AirVenture for the First Time Ever. The Osprey is the worlds first production Tiltrotar airplane.


The F-22 Raptor will be there on Thursday


The Goodyear Blimp will be there again this year flying every day over the field!


Suffice of to say, it is going to be a great time. Hope to see you there.