February 25, 2026 - No. 08


In This Issue

: US audit finds gaps in the FAA's oversight of United Airlines maintenance

: Flight Test Files: The Bell XV-15 Tiltrotor and NASA’s Quiet Revolution in Lift

: ‘World’s first true hybrid propulsion’ for drones eyed by Elbit with new pact

: Why the US Navy has no stealth bomber (Video)

: NASA Report Reveals the Failures That Left Two Astronauts ‘Stranded’ on the International Space Station

: Paris to New York in 2 hours - Airbus Mach 6 airliner (Video)

: WindRunner: The largest cargo aircraft ever to be built, capable of carrying six Chinooks

: EXCLUSIVE: Air Force to approve T-7 trainer production within days

: Did Pratt & Whitney accidentally revealed the U.S. Air Force's Boeing F-47 fighter future design?.



 


 


US audit finds gaps in the FAA's oversight of United Airlines maintenance

A federal government audit says FAA staffing shortages and high employee turnover have hindered the agency's oversight of airplane maintenance at United Airlines

By RIO YAMAT AP airlines and travel writer
February 20, 2026, 5:01 PM

The Associated Press
The ability of federal safety regulators to oversee airplane maintenance at United Airlines has been hindered by inadequate staffing, high employee turnover and the improper use of virtual inspections instead of on-site reviews in some cases, according to a government watchdog audit released Friday.

The U.S. Transportation Department's inspector general said the Federal Aviation Administration lacks sufficient staffing and workforce planning to effectively monitor United’s large fleet. Past audits by the government watchdog also highlighted FAA challenges overseeing other airline maintenance programs, including at American Airlines, Southwest Airlines and Allegiant Air.

The FAA declined to comment on the findings but referred The Associated Press to a letter it sent the inspector general's office that was included in the audit report. In it, the FAA said it agreed with most of the recommendations and was taking steps to address them by the end of the year.

“FAA will implement a more systemic approach to strengthen inspector capacity and will take other measures to ensure that staffing levels remain sufficient to meet surveillance requirements,” the letter said.

The recommendations included a reevaluation of staffing rules, an independent workplace survey of inspector workloads and office culture, and improved training on accessing and using United's safety data — a current gap that the report said currently keeps inspectors from fully evaluating maintenance issues and safety risk trends.

In a statement to AP, United said it works closely with the FAA on a daily basis in addition to employing its own internal safety management system.

“United has long advocated in favor of providing the FAA with the resources it needs for its important work," the carrier said.

The inspector general's office said the audit was conducted between May 2024 and December 2025, amid a series of maintenance-linked incidents at United.

It found that the FAA sometimes had its personnel conduct inspections “virtually” when it lacked staffing or funding for travel even though agency policy requires postponing reviews that can't be done on site. Doing the work remotely can create safety risks because inspectors may miss or misidentify maintenance problems, the reported stated.

“Inspectors we spoke with stated that their front-line managers instructed them to perform inspections virtually rather than postponing inspections,” the report said.

The audit also found that ongoing staffing shortages at the FAA inspection offices tasked with United's oversight have resulted in fewer inspections being conducted, limited surveillance of the carrier's maintenance operations and an “overall loss of institutional knowledge.”

In March 2024, passengers had to be evacuated from a United plane that rolled off a runway after landing in Houston. The next day, a United jetliner bound for Japan lost a tire while taking off from San Francisco but later landed safely in Los Angeles.

In December 2025, a United flight experienced an engine failure during takeoff from Dulles International Airport before safely returning to the airport.


 


 


Flight Test Files: The Bell XV-15 Tiltrotor and NASA’s Quiet Revolution in Lift At NASA’s Dryden Flight Research Center, the Bell XV-15 taught helicopter flight to attain airplane speed. 
Through careful testing, slow transitions, and thousands of flights, pilots and engineers learned how rotors, wings, and controls could share lift without conflict. The XV-15 never entered service, but it proved that tiltrotors could work and laid the foundation for everything that followed.

Kapil Kajal

Note: See photos and graphics in the original article. 


Published February 15, 2026

The unique XV-15 Tiltrotor aircraft is seen in vertical flight at NASA’s Dryden (now Armstrong) Flight Research Center. The XV-15s, manufactured by Bell, were involved in limited research at Dryden in 1980 and 1981.
Image via NASA

Since the 1940s, the Dryden Flight Research Center at Edwards, California, now known as the Armstrong Flight Research Center, has been the place where aviation ideas are taken out of theory and tested in the open air, over a vast desert lakebed that forgives mistakes but never hides them. Many aircraft that arrived at Dryden were already proven machines. A few arrived with questions so fundamental that no one yet knew whether the idea itself would survive flight. The Bell XV-15 belonged to that second group, which was built to combine the vertical lift of a helicopter with the speed of a fixed-wing airplane. Helicopters could lift straight up and land almost anywhere, but they were slow and inefficient over distance. Airplanes, on the other hand, were fast but demanded long runways. The XV-15 was an attempt to bridge that gap through a controlled transition.

This photo shows the unique XV-15 Tiltrotor aircraft in vertical flight at the NASA Dryden Flight Research Center. (Image via NASA)

The XV-15 did not begin as a production aircraft. Its development started in 1973 as a joint Army and NASA effort, funded as a “proof of concept” program. The goal was not to sell an aircraft, but to prove whether a tiltrotor, an aircraft that could rotate its engines and rotors in flight, could move smoothly and safely between vertical helicopter flight and horizontal airplane flight. By 1977, Bell Helicopter Textron built two aircraft; one became NASA 702, and the other NASA 703. By September 1979, airworthiness testing and initial proof-of-concept flights had been completed. What remained was to test and gradually push the aircraft to operate safely at its extreme design limits, such as higher speeds or higher altitudes, in front of engineers who remembered earlier tiltrotor attempts that had ended badly.

The XV-15 tilt rotor ships #1 and #2 parked on the NASA Dryden Flight Research Center ramp. (Image via NASA)

Earlier tiltrotor experiments, such as Bell’s own XV-3, had shown promise but problems such as sudden pitch changes, rotor interference, and control coupling, which had nearly ended the concept entirely. The XV-15 was designed from the beginning to counter these problems. The aircraft was powered by two Lycoming T-53 turboshaft engines, linked by a cross-shaft that drove three-bladed metal rotors, each 25 feet in diameter, allowing either engine to keep both rotors turning if one failed. By placing the engines and transmissions at the wingtips, Bell reduced loads on the cross-shaft and simplified structural stresses during transition.

The XV-15 tilt rotor aircraft undergoing tests on the VTOL stand. This allowed the engine and rotor system to undergo realistic testing before being committed to actual free flight. (Image via NASA)

Most importantly, the engines and rotors tilted together as a single unit. In vertical takeoff and landing mode, the proprotors pointed straight upward, producing lift like a helicopter. In airplane mode, they rotated forward, acting as propellers while the wing assumed the lifting role. The transition between these two states, the moment where most tiltrotors failed, became the focus of the entire program. NASA’s first XV-15 flight at Dryden took place in October 1980, operating from the Army contingent at Edwards Air Force Base. The aircraft lifted vertically, hovered, and behaved exactly as engineers hoped. Still, the engineers were cautious as the hover was the easy part; transition was everything.

Bell XV-15 during trials aboard USS Tripoli (LPH-10), August 1, 1983. (U.S. Navy photo)

In vertical flight, the XV-15 could simply rise into the air and hover there for close to an hour, behaving like a helicopter. Once flying, it could be operated in three distinct ways: as a helicopter, in a halfway state between helicopter and airplane, or fully converted into an airplane. The actual change from one to the other took only 10 to 15 seconds, but those few seconds mattered more than anything else, because that was when the lift moved from the spinning rotors to the wing and the aircraft’s aerodynamics quietly reshuffled themselves in ways no wind tunnel could fully predict. Test pilots moved into this phase carefully. Nacelles were rotated only a few degrees at first, and airspeed was allowed to build slowly. Each conversion revealed small truths about rotor behavior, wing loading, and control harmony.

Bell XV-15 Tiltrotor hovers near a U.S. Navy Bell UH-1N Twin Huey during trials aboard the amphibious assault ship USS Tripoli (LPH-10), August 1, 1983. (U.S. Navy photo)

Shortly, the XV-15 began performing at its best, rotating the proprotors continuously from vertical to horizontal while accelerating through the transition corridor. During this phase, it lifted smoothly and transferred from the rotors to the wing. After this, the aircraft behaved less like a helicopter and more like a turboprop airplane. Operating as a conventional airplane, the XV-15 could cruise for more than two hours. It first reached estimated cruise speeds of around 345 mph at 16,500 feet, and then a maximum speed of 375 mph at the same altitude, far more than conventional helicopters. The XV-15 showed that tiltrotors could deliver payloads over distances greater than 115 miles using roughly half the fuel of a helicopter. It demonstrated that aircraft could take off vertically, cruise like airplanes, and land in confined spaces without specialized infrastructure. In short, it offered a new category of flight.

XV-15 Tiltrotor in its flight testing its Search & Rescue capabilities. (NASA photo)
Between 1980 and 1982, both XV-15 aircraft flew regularly at NASA’s Dryden Flight Research Center, slowly building confidence one flight at a time. By the end of the program, the tiltrotors had logged more than a thousand flights in every possible mode, including hover, transition, and airplane flight. Some of those flights were about fixing problems rather than chasing performance, as engineers refined stability systems to calm unwanted oscillations and adjusted flaperons to deal with retreating blade stall. As pilots spent more time in the cockpit, the control laws evolved as well, shaped as much by feel as by mathematics. Eventually, the XV-15 left the safety of the desert. Tests in Arizona pushed it into hot-and-high conditions, where the air was thin, and margins were smaller. Later, the aircraft was taken into operational demonstrations, including shipboard trials, to see whether a tiltrotor could safely land on a moving deck and remain controllable in strong winds. All flight tests showed positive results.
XV-15 Tiltro

By the time the program concluded, the XV-15 transformed tiltrotor flight from a risky idea into a reality. The XV-15 never entered production but made the Bell-Boeing V-22 Osprey possible. The V-22 heavily utilized aerodynamic data, control law strategies, and operational insights derived from the successful XV-15 tiltrotor research aircraft. By the time the V-22 first flew in 1989, the hardest questions had already been answered by XV-15. In the long history of flight testing at Dryden, the test aircraft stands as one of the turning points of modern aviation. And like many aircraft in the Flight Test Files, the XV-15 did not change the world by entering service, but by proving that the world could be changed. Check our previous entries HERE.

Cutaway diagram of Bell XV-15 tiltrotor. (The History of The XV-15 Tilt Rotor Research Aircraft, by Martin D. Maisel, Demo J. Giulianetti, and Daniel C. Dugan.





 


‘World’s first true hybrid propulsion’ for drones eyed by Elbit with new pact

The company required a solution that complies with NATO standards for electric-stealth operation, and maintains military-grade reliability.

By Atharva Gosavi
Military
Jan 27, 2026 08:01 AM EST


An unmanned aerial vehicle. Stock image.
Getty Images

Israeli defense firm Elbit Systems has signed a 10-year pact with Lowental Hybrid Ltd. to extend mission endurance fivefold for its drones. The latter will supply its Native Parallel Hybrid propulsion systems for this cause.

By implementing these propulsion systems, Elbit Systems will achieve significant extended flight duration, minimize ground battery logistics requirements through in-flight charging, and maintain silent electric operation for covert missions.

Lowental Hybrid’s Chairman, Maj. Gen. (ret.) Amikam Norkin, and the former Commander of the Israeli Air Force, have endorsed this deal, supporting Elbit Systems’ attempts to enhance tactical UAV capabilities while adhering to evolving military operational requirements.

Elbit Systems aimed to significantly extend the flight time of its tactical UAVs while preserving quiet, low-signature performance critical for intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance missions.
The company required a solution that complies with NATO standards for electric-stealth operation, maintains military-grade reliability, and reduces reliance on ground-based battery logistics.

Reasons for signing up
Lowental Hybrid’s Native Parallel Hybrid was selected for its ability to deliver extended endurance with operational simplicity, continuous in-flight battery charging, and Israeli-developed technology ensuring supply-chain independence and compliance with strict defense and export regulations.

Unlike traditional combustion-only or fully electric setups, the system allows smooth switching between electric and combustion power modes. Flight tests confirmed its performance, and its modular architecture allows it to be integrated into a range of UAV platforms, supporting broader use beyond the initial rollout.
Details of the deal
The decade-long deal between the two firms includes development, procurement, and service with an initial scope of approximately $1.4 million. This stage will be followed by substantial multi-year revenue from additional systems and support.

Lowental Hybrid will provide dedicated engineering and integration support throughout the contract term, enabling Elbit Systems to integrate the hybrid propulsion technology across multiple UAV programs.

“Elbit Systems is a global leader in unmanned aerial solutions, and we are proud to collaborate with them on introducing true hybrid propulsion into a tactical platform. Our joint work marks an important technological milestone, enhancing endurance, reliability, and simplicity of use,” Doron Fridman, CEO, Lowental Hybrid Ltd, told Interesting Engineering in a statement.
“This achievement reflects how close cooperation between innovative startups and established defense leaders can accelerate meaningful progress in the UAV domain,” he continued.

Knowing the firm
Established in 2018 by CTO Itay Lowental and COO Netta Lowental, Lowental Hybrid Ltd. designs and produces Native Parallel Hybrid propulsion systems for tactical unmanned aerial vehicles.

Its patented architecture is hybrid at the core, combining electric stealth capabilities with the endurance of combustion power through a shared drivetrain. The system is designed to significantly extend flight duration while maintaining quiet operation and operational reliability, without requiring major airframe modifications.

Based in Israel, the company is led by CEO Doron Fridman and Chairman Maj. Gen. (Ret.) Amikam Norkin. Lowental Hybrid works with defense and UAV manufacturers to support the development of advanced propulsion solutions for mission-focused aerial platforms.





 


Why the US Navy has no stealth bomber

During the Cold War, the US Navy attempted to develop its own stealth attack aircraft to replace carrier based strike platforms. 

The A-12 Avenger II was designed as a stealthy flying wing capable of deep penetration missions. Severe weight issues, cost overruns, and missed deadlines led to its cancellation in the early 1990s. '

The failure reshaped naval aviation and pushed the Navy toward upgraded multirole fighters instead of a dedicated stealth bomber.





 


NASA’s administrator blames both the agency and Boeing for Starliner’s infamous problems

Margherita Bassi - Daily Correspondent
February 20, 2026


Starliner leaving the ISS in September 2024.  NASA/JSC, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

In the summer of 2024, the plight of two NASA astronauts, Suni Williams and Butch Wilmore, captured the world’s attention. On its first crewed test flight to the International Space Station (ISS), their Boeing spacecraft, Starliner, experienced propulsion system anomalies after launching on June 5, 2024, and the agency ultimately deemed it best for Williams and Wilmore to use a different spacecraft for their return.

As such, Starliner’s homecoming that September was in autonomous mode and the astronauts remained on the ISS. It wasn’t until March 2025 that the astronauts came back via SpaceX’s Crew-9 mission. Williams retired at the end of 2025.
Now, NASA has released a redacted investigation report on the mission’s failures that points the finger at both the agency and its contractor. The report identifies issues ranging from technological to cultural, though it specifies that investigations into the technical causes are ongoing.

“The Boeing Starliner spacecraft has faced challenges throughout its uncrewed and most recent crewed missions,” NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman says in a statement. “While Boeing built Starliner, NASA accepted it and launched two astronauts to space.”

The situation has been determined to be a Type A mishap, the “highest-level classification.” The deadly Columbia and Challenger space shuttle accidents were also Type A mishaps, as reported by the New York Times’ Kenneth Chang.
According to the report, the investigating team found “a complex interplay of hardware failures, qualification gaps, leadership missteps and cultural breakdowns that collectively posed unacceptable risks to crew safety.”

Quick facts: Spaceflight contractors
Boeing—like SpaceX—is contracted to shuttle astronauts to and from low-Earth orbit for NASA in its Commercial Crew Program. SpaceX has been flying people to the ISS in this program since 2020.

“Starliner has design and engineering deficiencies that must be corrected,” Isaacman said at a press conference yesterday. “But the most troubling failure revealed by this investigation is not hardware. It’s decision making and leadership that, if left unchecked, could create a culture incompatible with human spaceflight.”
NASA is implementing changes in response to the report, according to the statement.

“These are very complex programs, and complex programs like this fail in complex ways,” Don Platt, director of the Florida Institute of Technology Spaceport Education Center and a former ISS engineer, tells NPR’s Brendan Byrne. “Those organizational issues are, oftentimes, maybe even more important than the technical problems that they’re facing.”





 


Paris to New York in 2 hours - Airbus Mach 6 airliner

Airbus has explored radical hypersonic concepts capable of flying at Mach 6, cutting transatlantic travel to just two hours. Powered by advanced propulsion systems, this vision of the future would redefine long-haul flight if the engineering challenges can be solved.






 


WindRunner: The largest cargo aircraft ever to be built, capable of carrying six Chinooks

Jonathan Moynihan
20th February 2026 at 11:27am


Note: See photos in the original article. 

This is Radia's first go at designing and building an aircraft (Picture: Radia)

The team developing the largest cargo aircraft ever built has said that its military capabilities could be a game-changer. 
The Radia WindRunner is so vast that it can carry six fully constructed Chinook helicopters. 
It is 109 metres long with a payload bay capacity roughly 12 times that of a Boeing 747.

Mel Johnson, Radia's vice president of regulatory affairs, said: "It is a very remarkable scale.

"There's things that can be moved that currently are difficult to move because of volume restrictions, and while typically you think about moving payload weight around and how many C-17s or C-5s to carry a certain amount of mass, oftentimes the missions are really limited by volume.

"A good example of that is the movement of Chinooks.
"You don't weight out with a load of Chinooks, but you certainly volume out, so having this extra volume provides the real transformational capability that can be utilised by the military."
Aircraft can roll off ready for combat
The WindRunner loading military helicopters (Picture: Radia)
This is Radia's first go at designing and building an aircraft, as the company primarily works in the energy sector, and it was developed to transport wind turbines. 

The current heavy lifters in the Royal Air Force, like the Globemaster C-17 III, which has a 52-metre wingspan, often require disassembled cargo, meaning a Chinook can only be on board once its blades are removed. 

However, the WindRunner's design can hold four F-35 fighter jets without removing their wings; consequently, the aircraft can roll off onto the tarmac ready for combat. 
Thad Bibb, the company's vice president of business development, defence, said: "We like to say roll on ready and roll off ready.

"C-17 could carry one Chinook at a time max, and that's with the blades off and turbine off at the top right.

"To disassemble that for C-17 or for C5 takes about two days to take apart, takes a team of 12, about five days to put it back together, plus you've got to do a functional check flight."

He went on: "When I was lieutenant colonel, we used to deliver the Chinooks directly into Afghanistan from Spain, and we've moved 100 helicopters in, and you can imagine the difference of carrying six Chinooks on a WindRunner versus one on the C-17.

"And then on the WindRunner, you don't have to disassemble it, you can leave it fully assembled, so some big advantages there."
Ideal for Nato
WindRunner in flight seen from underneath (Picture: Radia)
Despite its vast size, the WindRunner does not need a massive, vulnerable air base. 

Thus, it is ideal for Nato's agile combat employment strategy and for delivering vital aircraft and military hardware to remote forward positions where they're needed. 

US defence chiefs are paying close attention to the concept, given that the last C-17 was constructed more than ten years ago. 

With aircraft carriers, the preferred way to transport combat-ready aerial assets over huge distances, can the WindRunner offer a faster alternative? 
"Just to be able to have equipment ready and be able to be useful, having that faster turnaround time can increase the capability of the forces," Mr Johnson added. 

"It helps in the perspective of with the existing material be more effective.
"Get the things back and forth and don't get it logged you know stuck in transit."
Radia is aiming for the first flight of this giant to take place in 2029. 






 


EXCLUSIVE: Air Force to approve T-7 trainer production within days

"We're confident in the design of the aircraft that we have," Air Force Program Executive Officer for Training Rodney Stevens told Breaking Defense. “We're ready to start proving that we can produce the aircraft at rate.”

By Michael Marrow 
February 20, 2026 1:00 pm

APT-2, the first T-7A Red Hawk for the USAF, flies over Edwards Air Force Base, Calif. (Air Force photo by Bryce Bennett)

WASHINGTON — The Air Force is preparing to declare its T-7 Red Hawk training jet ready for production in days, following years of delays, an Air Force official overseeing the program told Breaking Defense in an exclusive interview. 

The T-7 will train new generations of fighter and bomber pilots as it replaces the Air Force’s aging T-38 Talon, which entered service in 1961. But the production decision, also known as Milestone C, comes over two years later than initially projected, due both to design woes at Boeing and a service strategy to accelerate the program, as Breaking Defense previously reported. 

“Milestone C is monumental,” Rodney Stevens, the Air Force’s program executive officer for training, said. “Essentially, what we’re saying is, we’re confident in the design of the aircraft that we have, and that we’re ready to start proving that we can produce the aircraft at rate to meet the inventory needs of Air Education and Training Command.” 

Though Milestone C is a big step, the program can’t “rest on its laurels,” he added.
That’s because much work still lies ahead. Milestone C will use a phased approach, which Stevens said will help mitigate concurrency — an overlap between development and production, where unwelcome discoveries could spur design changes to the aircraft.

The Air Force will approve at least three production lots one by one, and continue individually greenlighting them “until we can close out all the associated test activities that remain,” Stevens said.

Stevens maintained that Boeing “is committed to the program wholly,” saying that the Air Force and industry team “have a clear understanding that we are driving towards our North Star together.” 

Their goal is to reach initial operational capability, which is measured by delivering 14 aircraft that are ready to train new pilots, no later than November 2027, he said. That means the first pilots can begin training fully on the jets in 2028.

“We continue to make good progress on the program in close collaboration with the U.S. Air Force,” Dan Gillian, vice president and general manager of Boeing’s Air Dominance unit said in a statement to Breaking Defense. 

“The T-7 program’s active management approach has allowed us to provide a production-ready configuration to the Air Force prior to low-rate initial production, further reducing future risk and accelerating the path to delivering this critical capability,” he continued. “We have delivered two aircraft into service at Joint Base San Antonio-Randolph along with the Ground Based Training System. Our focus continues to be on delivering this new critical training capability.”

Concurrency “Is Something We Carry”
Back in 2023, the Government Accountability Office issued a scathing assessment of the T-7 program, pointing to issues like the trainer’s escape system and flight control software that could further delay the Red Hawk’s fielding. The report additionally raised concerns of strain between Boeing and the Air Force, though a service official later pushed back on that assessment in an interview with Breaking Defense.

Asked about the remaining development work, Stevens explained that changes to the T-7’s escape system won’t push back the impending production decision. Although further testing remains, he said he is “confident … that we’re on a good trajectory for a safe escape system.”

Stevens also said that while refining the trainer’s flight control software doesn’t currently jeopardize the schedule, it’s something to keep an eye on. Future flight tests could reveal new issues when practicing maneuvers like a high angle of attack. 

Still, he maintained that once pilots start flying the trainers in 2028, the T-7 “will be as good as, if not slightly better, from a flight sciences perspective — number of Gs it can pull, how fast it can go in those areas — [than the] T-38.” 

Stevens said the aircraft’s capabilities will be “iteratively” expanded, and that additional software drops will come as needed to close out the aircraft’s engineering and manufacturing development (EMD) “in the 2029 timeframe.” 

Despite the risk of overlapping development and production, Stevens said he is “not concerned about concurrency.” 

“It’s something that we carry, but it’s something that we will manage very closely with AETC and then Boeing,” he said.

The trainer’s fixed-price contract — which has forced Boeing to absorb roughly $3.2 billion in losses on the program — can help ameliorate some of that risk, at least from a financial perspective. 

Boeing will fix any “safety-critical items” discovered during flight tests or other issues that stop the T-7 from meeting AETC’s training requirements, Stevens said. But if a new problem doesn’t fall into either of those categories, he added, “then that’s a conversation that we would have with AETC.”

Stevens noted that Boeing has already offered to, “at no cost, look at opportunities to improve certain aspects of the T-7,” such as extending the aircraft’s range. 
The Air Force is also offering Boeing new financial incentives to achieve certain targets in three main areas: completing EMD, becoming ready for production and fielding the ground-based training system. 

According to Stevens, Boeing has hit 17 of 19 targets so far — roughly 90 percent. (He did not share how much money that success has earned the company.)
Stevens said the Air Force has “fully embraced” the active management strategy put in place by former Air Force acquisition boss Andrew Hunter, noting that it aligns with Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s directives to speed capabilities to the field. 
“We have our challenges. It is difficult,” he said. “But it allows us to really robustly and actively manage the program through a mission-outcome lens.”

The T-7 Arrives
Boeing has now delivered two T-7s to Joint Base San Antonio-Randolph, Texas, where the 99th Flying Training Squadron became the first Air Force unit to receive the Red Hawk in a Jan. 9 ceremony. 

Stevens said one aircraft, dubbed APT-5, will be used for “familiarization training,” where a Boeing test pilot will fly with instructor pilots from the 99th to get them acquainted with the Red Hawk. The other aircraft, APT-3, is being used to train maintainers. 

The T-7 is currently restricted to flights with test pilots, in test airspace. An update planned for March will allow 99th pilots to start flying and familiarize themselves with the aircraft. Those pilots will get qualified on the aircraft through Type 1 aircrew training, which Stevens said will last into “early 2027.” Then in spring or summer 2027, the program will start the initial operational test and evaluation phase, where new weapons systems are measured for their operational effectiveness.

Stevens said three more aircraft are further slated for delivery this year. Two will be production-representative test jets, which the Air Force decided to buy last year to provide extra testing capacity. The third will be a developmental jet that will be converted to a test aircraft and delivered to Randolph following electromagnetic testing.

Once new trainees can start flying the T-7, Stevens said he was confident that the Red Hawk will be far more effective at equipping pilots to operate modern aircraft. 
“The T-7 postures you … to more easily become a fourth-, fifth- or sixth-generation fighter pilot or bomber pilot,” Stevens said. “The T-7 today will offer so much more as it relates to what type of pilot [it] is going to produce starting in 2028, compared to the type of pilot that the T-38 produces today.”

But plenty of work remains: The Air Force expects to eventually own more than 300 copies of the jet.

“From a total of 351 aircraft, five have been delivered. So, we’ve got 346 to go,” Stevens said. 



 





Did Pratt & Whitney accidentally revealed the U.S. Air Force's Boeing F-47 fighter future design?.

Pratt & Whitney shared a video about the development of its XA103 adaptive cycle engine, designed to meet the requirements of the U.S. Air Force’s NGAP program, which itself underpins the broader NGAD initiative under which the Boeing F-47 fighter was selected as the successor to the F-22 Raptor.

19 Feb, 2026 - 8:53Defense News Aerospace 2026


Written by Jérôme Brahy

On February 17, 2026, Pratt & Whitney presented new details and video of its XA103 adaptive cycle engine developed for the US Air Force Next Generation Adaptive Propulsion (NGAP) program. The NGAP engine is intended to power the Next Generation Air Dominance (NGAD) fighter for which Boeing was selected in 2025 to develop the F-47, which will replace the F-22 Raptor. Because the visual accompanying the engine update depicts a sixth-generation fighter linked to the NGAP effort, it can be interpreted as potentially reflecting elements of the future F-47 design.

The XA103 engine is designed to power the US Air Force Next Generation Air Dominance (NGAD) fighter known as the F-47, which led to questions about whether the shared video reflects design elements of the future F-47’s configuration. (Picture source: Pratt & Whitney)


Pratt & Whitney spoke publicly about the progress of its XA103 adaptive cycle engine, explaining how this propulsion system is being developed for the U.S. Air Force’s Next Generation Adaptive Propulsion (NGAP) program. However, this means that, given that the NGAP is intended to power the Next Generation Air Dominance (NGAD) fighter jet, under which Boeing was selected in March 2025 to develop the F-47 as the successor to the F-22 Raptor, the next-generation fighter shown in the video accompanying the article could reasonably be interpreted as a new F-47 visual. This sequence links the engine, the propulsion program, the air dominance concept, and the selected aircraft into a single chain of development.

Boeing’s contract for the F-47 exceeds $20 billion and covers the development of at least 185 aircraft, with first flight expected in 2028 and fielding in the 2030s. The program is structured to replace the 195-built F-22 fleet, of which 187 aircraft remain operational. In its article, Pratt & Whitney outlines how it is using a fully digital development environment to advance the XA103 adaptive cycle engine for the U.S. Air Force’s Next Generation Adaptive Propulsion (NGAP) program, describing a demonstration conducted at the RTX Technology Research Center with an Air Force delegation present.

Engineers operated a digital model of an adaptive engine architecture capable of shifting between higher-thrust and higher-efficiency modes, monitored by hundreds of digital sensors, then intentionally deactivated one sensor and identified its function in minutes rather than hours through integrated software tools. The company states that the XA103 is the first engine it has designed in a fully digital environment from concept through manufacturing, using a collaborative workspace that connects up to 1,500 engineers and hundreds of suppliers who would otherwise work across multiple software systems and paper-based processes. 

Model-based systems are used to embed design, manufacturing, and inspection data directly into 3D digital models, allowing test histories and configuration data, including more than 2,000 instrumentation sensors on current engine test assets, to be accessed and analyzed without relying on individual institutional knowledge. Approximately 200 suppliers are being trained in model-based definition for manufacturing and inspection, with machine-readable models intended to reduce translation errors and accelerate production start once technical data packages are received. The article notes that a detailed design review was completed in early 2025 and that prototype construction is underway ahead of ground testing expected in the late 2020s. Moreover, the XA103 adaptive engine concept is presented as a system able to reconfigure airflow in flight to balance thrust, fuel efficiency, thermal management, and durability requirements for future combat aircraft applications.

The XA103 is a three-stream adaptive cycle engine designed to shift airflow between a third bypass stream and the core and fan streams, allowing the engine to balance fuel efficiency and thrust depending on mission phase. In high-efficiency mode, the third stream increases bypass ratio and provides additional cooling capacity, while in high-thrust mode, airflow is redirected to maximize power output for combat maneuvering. The thrust class associated with NGAP engines is 35,000 to 40,000 lbf, equivalent to 156 to 178 kN with afterburner. The adaptive architecture is intended to improve fuel efficiency by up to 25% and increase thrust by up to 20% compared with conventional fixed-cycle engines. Additional cooling and electrical generation margins are designed to support advanced sensors, electronic warfare systems, and potential directed-energy capabilities. Critical design review of the XA103 was completed in February 2024, and prototype construction is underway with ground testing expected in the late 2020s.

The Next Generation Adaptive Propulsion (NGAP) program traces its origins to earlier adaptive engine efforts that began in 2007 under the Adaptive Versatile Engine Technology initiative, followed by the Adaptive Engine Technology Demonstrator in 2012 and the Adaptive Engine Transition Program in 2016. Under AETP, demonstrators designated XA100 for General Electric and XA101 for Pratt & Whitney were developed with a focus that included potential F-35 re-engining. As sixth-generation fighter requirements evolved, the Air Force separated NGAP as a distinct propulsion track optimized for the Next Generation Air Dominance (NGAD) crewed aircraft. The competing designs under NGAP are the General Electric XA102 and the Pratt & Whitney XA103. Development contracts for these engines have ceilings of up to $3.5 billion per company through 2032. The propulsion system is therefore not an isolated project but a central enabler of the NGAD aircraft’s range, speed, and thermal management envelope.


The Next Generation Air Dominance program grew out of DARPA’s 2014 Air Dominance Initiative and subsequent Aerospace Innovation Initiative X-plane demonstrators, with the Air Force evolving its Air Superiority 2030 concept into a family-of-systems approach. NGAD is structured around a sixth-generation crewed fighter originally referred to as the Penetrating Counter-Air platform, supported by uncrewed Collaborative Combat Aircraft operating in a manned-unmanned teaming concept. In March 2025, the Air Force selected Boeing’s design, designated F-47, and the program entered engineering and manufacturing development. The service has indicated an intent to procure about 200 F-47 aircraft and more than 1,000 Collaborative Combat Aircraft, planning roughly two uncrewed systems per F-47 and F-35A. Fiscal 2025 budget requests include $3.3 billion for NGAD development, of which $2.7 billion is allocated to the crewed fighter and $557 million to CCAs. The program timeline anticipates first flight in 2028 and operational fielding in the 2030s.

The visual associated with the propulsion discussion shows a blended wing configuration with forward canards positioned just aft of the cockpit and no conventional vertical stabilizers, indicating a control architecture relying on integrated trailing-edge surfaces. The cockpit appears as a raised bubble canopy placed forward to maximize pilot visibility within a low-observable planform. A dorsal air-to-air refueling receptacle is visible behind the cockpit area, consistent with long-range operations supported by tanker aircraft. The rear section shows twin engines with thrust-vectoring nozzles similar in arrangement to those used on the F-22, suggesting an emphasis on maneuverability at high speeds. The overall configuration emphasizes sustained high-speed flight, extended combat radius exceeding 1,000 nautical miles, or 1,900 kilometers, and a top speed above Mach 2. In visual proportion and planform logic, the aircraft appears closer to a flying wing configuration than traditional tail-equipped fighters, while retaining a crewed cockpit.
The F-47 is intended to replace the F-22 Raptor, which first flew in September 1997 and entered service in December 2005 following development under the Advanced Tactical Fighter program. A total of 195 F-22s were built, including eight test aircraft and 187 operational examples, with production ending in 2011 after procurement was capped below earlier targets. The F-22 introduced supercruise capability, thrust vectoring, and low observability but is expected to be gradually succeeded by the F-47 as it reaches operational maturity. Air Force leadership has stated that sixth-generation crewed aircraft are necessary to counter advanced integrated air defense systems, electronic warfare capabilities, and emerging foreign sixth-generation designs. The NGAD concept also allows for potential regional tailoring, with variants optimized for Indo-Pacific range requirements or European theater distances. Within this framework, the XA103 engine is not only a propulsion upgrade but a foundational element linking adaptive cycle technology to the operational profile of the F-47 and the future structure of U.S. air dominance.



Curt Lewis