Aerospace

U-2 spy plane pilot Powers honored with Silver Star

Capt. Francis Gary Powers, the Air Force pilot whose U-2 spy plane was shot down over the Soviet Union in 1960, was posthumously honored Friday in a medal ceremony at the Pentagon.

Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. Norton A. Schwartz presented the Silver Star Medal to Capt. Powers' children, Gary Powers Jr. and Dee Powers, in the Hall of Heroes, in tribute to Powers' "heroic action and his loyalty to the United States of America during a pivotal time in our nation's history."

"My sister, myself, my wife, my son, aunts and uncles, cousins, the … Read more

Watch Venus' trek across the sun without going blind (live video)

If you don't want to wait another 105 years to watch Venus make its way across the face of the sun, here are ways to safely observe today's event, which starts around 2 p.m. PT.

You can watch NASA's live feed:

Streaming Live by Ustream

You can watch CBSNews.com's live feed (Click here starting around 2:30 p.m. PT).

Or, watch it from the convenience of your smart phone via the Venus Transit app, available on Android and iOS. The app also lets you share your observations with other viewers.

If you want … Read more

Hydrogen-fueled Phantom Eye UAV takes to the sky

The bulbous Phantom Eye UAV flew for less than a half-hour in its debut autonomous flight -- but that was just a bite-size test in preparation for eventually staying aloft for days at a time.

Boeing announced this morning that its Phantom Eye made a 28-minute flight at the end of last week, reaching an altitude of 4,080 feet and a cruising speed of 62 knots. The unmanned aircraft, which looks rather like a propane tank outfitted with wings and a tail structure, is powered by liquid hydrogen. Ground tests took place earlier this year.

Eventually, the Boeing-funded aircraft … Read more

Solar plane midway through first intercontinental flight

Solar Impulse, a Swiss sun-powered aircraft, on Friday finished the first leg of its attempt at an intercontinental flight without using a single drop of fuel.

The solar plane took off Thursday from Payerne, Switzerland, bound for Morocco. It landed safely Friday on a planned three-day technical stopover in Madrid, where it will get a new pilot.

If successful, the 1,550-mile journey will be the longest to date for the craft, which last year completed its first international flight from its home in Switzerland to Brussels.

Pilot Andre Borschberg handled the first leg of the trip for the Solar … Read more

SpaceX Dragon capsule reaches space station (live video)

Stream videos at Ustream

The payoff moment of the historic SpaceX mission to the International Space Station is upon us.

A robotic arm on the International Space Station has reached out and captured the SpaceX Dragon capsule at a distance of about 10 meters. Next up in this historic mission: docking with the space station.

The capture occurred at 9:56 a.m. ET / 6:56 a.m. PT. It had been expected to occur about an hour earlier, but the capsule held at the 30-meter point as the ISS crew made evaluations and adjustments.

Folks at SpaceX, founded by … Read more

Boeing KC-46A flies through early review

We've written here a number of times about U.S. Air Force aircraft designed way back in the middle of the 20th century -- the B-52 bomber, the U-2 spy plane, the C-130 all-purpose airlift aircraft -- that are still pulling duty in this second decade of the 21st century.

But of course, the Pentagon does buy its share of new designs to keep pace with changing times and the demands of modern war-fighting. (Consider the saga of the multibajillion-dollar F-35 joint strike fighter.)

One of those newer-fangled aircraft destined to join the inventory in the not-too-distant future is … Read more

SpaceX sets May 19 as date for space station mission

SpaceX and NASA said today that May 19 is the new launch date for the first-ever attempt to send a private company's rocket to the International Space Station.

Intended as a demonstration flight, the mission is designed to give NASA and SpaceX information that will help them plan future missions to the space station. Weather scrapped the previous attempt at the launch, which had been scheduled for May 7.

Unless weather or other factors intervene, SpaceX's Falcon 9 rocket and Dragon spacecraft will launch from the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida on May 19. On May … Read more

Europe to explore Jupiter's icy moons

The European Space Agency will launch a probe to Jupiter and its icy moons in the search of habitable zones and a better understanding of our outer solar system.

The Jupiter Icy Moons Explorer, or JUICE, is scheduled to launch in 2022 and arrive at Jupiter eight years later to explore Jupiter and its moons for at least three years.

Jupiter's icy moons, Europa and Ganymede, are of great interest to space explorers because they are thought to have the conditions for life to form.

Ganymede, in particular, is an interesting subject to scientists because it is a water … Read more

At long last, Boeing delivers the first next-gen 747

EVERETT, Wash.--Get ready, aviation fans. Seats aboard Boeing's new 747-8 Intercontinental are almost ready for you. And today, at an event here, Boeing finally handed over the keys to the first of the next-general planes to a commercial airline customer.

The new airplane, which Boeing first unveiled at a huge ceremony here a year ago, has been in testing since then. But today, Lufthansa became the first airline to officially own one of the aircraft, the first of 20 it has ordered, and of 130 total orders Boeing has received for it. … Read more