Briefs
Wednesday, September 30th, 2020
Great long piece in The Guardian on the aviation meltdown.
Thursday, September 17th, 2020
Israel Aviation Industries’ long-established Heron flew to Ben-Gurion, marking the first ever landing of a drone at a civilian airport.
Sunday, April 19th, 2020
Marc Andreessen: Build, baby!
Sunday, January 26th, 2020
Two interestingly contrarian pieces in the Daily Mail by authorities in their respective fields: “Ja, we Germans are jealous of Brexit” by Alexander Von Schoenburg, editor-at-large of Bild; and “Why woke diets featuring superfoods such as avocado are leading to a surge of distressing gut problems” by Luci Daniels, former chairman of the British Dietetic Association.
Tuesday, October 8th, 2019
11 Brilliant Ways To Redeem Virgin Atlantic Flying Club Miles by Spencer Howard at GodSaveThePoints. Most are not actually flying Virgin Atlantic but their partner airlines
Saturday, September 28th, 2019
September 25th, 2019, a Virgin Atlantic plane landed in Tel Aviv for the first time. Airplane travel writer Gilbert Ott was aboard.
Tuesday, September 24th, 2019
James Ketchell completes his gyrocopter global circumnavigation, apparently the first person to do so. Awesome.
Monday, July 1st, 2019
The bastards finally did it: Sde Dov Airport, within walking distance from Tel Aviv, closes. You’d have thought that enough powers-that-be would have liked a nice little airfield within 5 minutes of town. Well, hopefully eventually they’ll build another one in the Med. Update: They’re still talking. Umpteen objections submitted regarding the existing plan.
Saturday, September 8th, 2018
McKinsey offers suggestions for lean airline operations. I find this oddly exciting.
Tuesday, August 21st, 2018
This Globes article reports interesting stats re Israeli air traffic. After the domestic carriers, Wizz Air is the top airline by flights, Turkish Airlines by passengers. They’re followed by EasyJet and Aeroflot. Nasty rhetorical exchanges between the national leaders notwithstanding, the Turkish national carrier will soon operate 10 flights a day to Israel!
Tuesday, January 2nd, 2018
This 1-hour Smithsonian production is a history of America in the Roaring 20s, with amazing newly-colorized footage. Richly effortlessly narrated by Liev Schreiber, it remedies our black & white impression of this not-so-distant mirror. There are things I should have learned about in school but did not, particularly the Greenwood massacre.
Saturday, September 9th, 2017
Enjoy this superb little series on contemporary American commercial aviation by Slate, from security theatre to the pilot shortage.
Monday, September 5th, 2016
In this report on Ryanair’s service between Budapest and Eilat, anna.aero lists the low-cost airlines flying to Israel. All the others fly to Ben-Gurion. So that’s Eilat to Budapest in February roundtrip for 85€!!!
Monday, July 18th, 2016
Life meets Goblin. Franky Zapata flies his Flyboard Air in Monaco during the Grand Prix on May 29th, 2016 [via my Dad].
Thursday, July 24th, 2014
Sunday, July 15th, 2012
The stuffed former pet cat looks eerily alive reborn as a remote control helicopter. I just don’t know what to think or feel or say about this.
Wednesday, May 9th, 2012
“Nation on the Move” is the magnificent second episode of the America Revealed PBS series. Interestingly, the show is British-made.
Friday, February 17th, 2012
Francis Fukuyama builds a drone. Yes, that Francis Fukuyama.
Saturday, October 8th, 2011
Monday, September 26th, 2011
Conrad Black, facing more jail time, remains irrepressible.
Thursday, August 11th, 2011
The reprap, a self-replicating 3d-printer. Most mind-boggling thing ever.
Thursday, June 30th, 2011
Fox News slideshow from the 49th Paris Air Show.
Sunday, June 12th, 2011
Al Schwimmer, founder of Israel Aircraft Industries, dies at 94. Haaretz obit.
Wednesday, April 13th, 2011
GAGA-1, a hobby balloon satellite.
O reason not the need — give us the Immersive Cocoon.
Wednesday, January 6th, 2010
Over at The Atlantic, this is perhaps the piece and subsequent conversation in the comments on applying the Israeli airport security method in the USA. “I’d say, as a generalization, screeners here possess above-average intelligence, whereas your average TSA screener seems to be a working stiff.” Yes, and working stiff seems an overstatement.
Thursday, December 3rd, 2009
Climategate so far.
Just how close were we to catastrophe at Copenhagen?
Friday, July 31st, 2009
EasyJet begins Luton-Tel Aviv flights in November, 2009. With a suitcase, the all-inclusive cost of a return flight is £135, less than half of current prices!
Monday, September 22nd, 2008
Replacing Heathrow with a 24-hour artificial island-based airport in the Thames Estuary.
CEO Chris Best talks Substack with Eric Johnson of Recode. Email as a reading medium, I’m not drawn to it, but maybe because I still live with spam.