Skip to main content

Subscribe to Smithsonian magazine and get a FREE tote.

Air & Space Magazine

Six Mustangs in trail: Now THAT’s a tight formation.

The Warbird Woodstock

A new book highlights the final Gathering of Mustangs in 2007

None

Shenzhou 8 Docks In Orbit

China succeeds on its first space rendezvous and docking mission.

None

When Tractors Attack

How to turn a cropduster into a warrior.

None

A Universe Throttling Up

Astrophysicist Adam Riess talks about his Nobel-winning discovery that the expansion of the universe is accelerating.

NASA Chief Technologist Bobby Braun addressing the AARP "Orlando @50+" Conference in Florida last year.

NASA’s Future in Technology

Bobby Braun shares what’s in the Agency’s R&D pipeline.

D’oh! Ten Goofs in Space

There are some situations even astronauts can’t train for

The TWA terminal was the architectural high point at Kennedy airport — and dream city for young aircrew.

Confessions of a Flight Engineer

Flashlights, timers, and breath mints required.

With telescopes both inside and out, Museum educators use a variety of filters to show visitors spots on the sun, craters on the moon, and the phases of Venus.

In the Museum: The People’s Observatory

Bringing telescopes where the people are.

A Babe Bee that powered countless aircraft models hitched a ride to space.

Flights & Fancy: What Would You Send to Orbit?

Mementoes in an astronaut’s luggage

A 2010 flight of two F-15Es (here, a Strike Eagle in Afghanistan earlier this year) saved the lives of 30 coalition troops surrounded by 100 insurgents.

Moments and Milestones: Trophy Mission

Honors for a risky bombing run

During the United States’ final 24 hours in Vietnam, American nationals and Vietnamese refugees were crowded onto Marine and Air Force helicopters that landed within the U.S. embassy compound.

Last Men Out

As Saigon fell, a small band of Marines pulled off the final evacuation.

Tata (circa 1960) wrote copious memos to his staff about everything from inflight coffee (“it tasted like bean soup”) to crew hairstyles (one stewardess “had an enormous hair bun at the back, larger than her whole head. She looked ridiculous”).

Karachi to Bombay to Calcutta

The struggle to start Air-India.

Leo Windecker’s proof-of- concept Fibaloy aircraft used fixed landing gear and aluminum control surfaces to cut down on development time and costs.

Just One Word: Plastics

The world’s first all-composite airplane may fly again.

When a Super Cub ran out of fuel and had to land on uninhabited Kayak lsland in Alaska in May 2011, the pilot and passenger tried both low- and high-tech alerts. In addition to the “SOS,” they activated a SPOT beacon, and were rescued by the Coast Guard.

How to Find a Missing Airplane

Airplanes can vanish without a trace. Why is effective tracking technology being ignored?

At the 2002 Nellis Air Show near Las Vegas, a Sabre heads up an A team in a USAF Heritage Flight: (from left) P-51 Mustang, P-47 Thunderbolt, F-15 Eagle, P-38 Lightning, and TF-51.

Could You Fly a Sabre?

The challenge of handling a 1950s MiG killer

Airman George Johnson (in a T-33 in late 1955) spent hundreds of hours maintaining Sabrejets and much less time flying one.

Mind If I Borrow It?

The day an Air Force mechanic commandeered a North American F-86

Though he had a student pilot’s permit, Pyle never got a license.

Byline: Ernie Pyle

The country’s best-known war correspondent learned his trade as an aviation reporter.

And the winners are…Landon Fisher, John Easum, and Michael Gerritsen (left to right) from Rockwall-Heath High School in Texas. (Team member Colt McNally is not pictured.)

The Lodi Rocket Rebels

In a model rocketry contest, New Jersey high school students launch an egg — and something more.

Bush flying has unique challenges. This Quest Kodiak gets a little extra thrust on takeoff from the slope of a dirt airstrip carved out of a hill in East Kalimantan, Indonesia.

Rough Riders

Five bushplanes and the places only they can fly.

None

Ronald Greeley: A Gentleman and a Scholar

Some scientists are both great researchers and fine human beings. Ron Greeley was one of them.

Page 181 of 320