Afterburner - The Aviation Magazine

24 June 2025

CIVIL AVIATION

Forty new Airbus A220 aeroplanes for LOT Polish Airlines

On 16th June 2025, Airbus announced via its website that LOT Polish Airlines had placed an order for forty medium-haul, narrow-body aircraft from the A220 family. That order marks the first time in history of the Polish national carrier when [...]
AVIATION HISTORY

20 June 1914 – Fischamend mid-air collision / Körting disaster

On 20th June 1914, two Austro-Hungarian aircraft, M.III Körting airship and Farman F.20 biplane, collided in mid-air near Fischamend, Lower Austria. As a result of the accident, both aircraft were destroyed and none of their crews survived. The M.III Körting [...]
SPACE

Bringing new life to F-4 Phantom II – the Starlaunch project

In recent months, references are made to possible use of McDonnel Douglas F-4 Phantom II for space launch missions. Such speculations arose in late April of 2025, due to financial documents published by Starfighters Space, Inc., in which the company [...]
PHOTO OF THE WEEK

Aero L-39NG Skyfox

Aero L-39NG Skyfox (c/n 167017, ´0478´ of Centrum Leteckého Výcviku / Flight Training Centre – CLV) taking-off for flying display during the 33rd Aviatická pouť (Aviation Fair) air show, Pardubice, June 2025. Search for a successor of Aero L-39 Albatros, [...]
CIVIL AVIATION

Global airliner fleet to reach 50,000 aircraft by 2044

The 2025 Commercial Market Outlook (CMO) forecast, recently released by Boeing, predicts the global fleet to reach approximately 50,000 commercial aircraft by 2044. The company also emphasized that during the upcoming two decades, the air travel market growth will be [...]

Operation K – the longest bomb raid at the time

AVIATION HISTORY

26 May 2025

Between 3rd and 5th March 1942, the naval aviation of the Japanese Imperial Navy performed the long-range bomb raid on Oahu Island, commonly known as the second attack on Pearl Harbor. Officially codenamed Kē-Sakusen (K作戦 [...]

20th anniversary of Gripen service with the Czech Air Force

FEATURED

21 April 2025

Twenty years ago, on 18th April 2005, the first Swedish-made supersonic jet fighters arrived to 21. základna taktického letectva (the 21st Tactical Air Force Base) in Čáslav, therefore opening the Gripen era in the Czech [...]

AVIATION HISTORY