(Story & Pics Gareth Calitz) – Hot air ballooning has always been a bucket list item for me and finally I was given the chance to experience the oldest form of flight known to man. Dale de Klerk, the CEO of Bill Harrop’s “Original” Balloon Safaris, invited SA Flyer forRead More →
(Story & Pics Rob Russell) – Ag Aviation Africa (AAA), the Sub-Saharan and the Middle East agent for Air Tractor, hosted an open day and launch party before the Stellenbosch airshow to introduce their newly approved Aircraft Training Organisation (ATO), Ag Aviation Flight Academy (AAFA). THE AVIATION COMMUNITY, customers, potentialRead More →
TRUE STORY – TEXT AND IMAGES – CLINTON CARROLL. DIRECTOR: AERONAUTICAL AVIATION; LANSERIA I often get asked, “Why are avionics so expensive?” or “What is the point in upgrading and old aircraft?”, or I get told; “I don’t want to over capitalise on my aircraft”. At the end of theRead More →
This brief reminiscence brings to an end the series of anecdotes from Doc Mark Holliday reflecting on his many outlandings experienced during thirty years of competitive gliding. MY VERY FIRST SA NATIONALS competition was back in the good old days in Vryburg. I had leaking waterbags, so I launched anRead More →
(Text: Jason Beamish and Guy Leitch Images: Shane Doyle) The Savage Bobber must be the ultimate Piper Cub in that it has been stripped down to the absolute bare essentials for flight. This unique aircraft with its uncovered fuselage is like nothing else on the market. THE BIG IDEA ISRead More →
Arizona’s Rotor X wants to step up from being the world’s biggest kit helicopter manufacturer and get into the e-VTOL game. Their design is “dramatically more efficient and less expensive than all other e-VTOL concepts being proposed or developed today.” Its huge blades could also make it one of theRead More →
A team of researchers working at Johannes Kepler University has developed an autonomous drone using optical sectioning algorithm technology to improve search-and-rescue efforts. In their paper published in the journal Science Robotics, the group describes their drone modifications. Andreas Birk with Jacobs University Bremen has published a Focus piece in theRead More →
(FLIGHT TEST) – The Guimbal Cabri G2 has developed a large and loyal band of followers across Africa. Many of these were students who learned to fly this endearing and very competent helicopter with Starlite Flight Training in Mossel Bay. HISTORY AND DEVELOPMENT The French might make quirky cars, butRead More →
(Peter Garrison) Where Do Little Aeroplanes Come From? They grow in the heads of little kids… AS A YOUNG BOY I LOVED AEROPLANES. It was in the late forties and early fifties, the era when jets were replacing props. Except for the Douglas Skyraider – a great homely radial-engine taildraggingRead More →
