News, deep dives, and analysis — every Bell story, newest first.
Luke Maximo Bell flew a rebuilt quadcopter for 4 hours, 21 minutes and 39 seconds on a single battery charge, breaking the Guinness World Record for longest flight of a small electric multirotor drone. Independent witnesses observed the attempt on a farm outside Cape Town, South Africa. The result beat the previous certified mark of…
A Bell 407 helicopter near JFK reported a drone over Floyd Bennett Field. The pilot identified it as a model plane, and the FAA isn't investigating.
The Texas Department of Public Safety has seized eight drones flown inside the Federal Aviation Administration’s Temporary Flight Restriction zone around Houston 2026 FIFA World Cup venues since the tournament opened. One operator now faces felony charges, per KHOU, after DPS Air Ops tracked the aircraft to roughly 900 feet (274 m) over a restricted area. It is the first major US sporting event…
Vivid Sydney just pulled the plug on every drone show left in its lineup. The trigger came Monday night, when roughly 89 drones dropped out of the sky during the festival’s Star-Bound performance at Cockle Bay. Eighty-three of them hit the water of Darling Harbour, six more came down on the boardwalk, and nobody was…
Australian aerospace engineer Benjamin Biggs pushed his Blackbird speed drone to 730 km/h (454 mph) on a downwind run and 640 km/h (398 mph) flying back into the wind, for a two-direction average of 685 km/h (426 mph). The average clears the 657.59 km/h (408.6 mph) figure that holds the official Guinness World Record for…
Beijing's near-total drone ban takes effect May 1 with an April 30 registration deadline, hitting DJI as it fights a $1.56B FCC loss in US court.
Shares of Aevex Corp. doubled Monday, April 20, 2026, just two trading sessions after the military drone manufacturer listed on the New York Stock Exchange. Class A shares jumped as much as 49% to $40.25, up from the initial public offering price of $20 set last week, according to a Bloomberg report by Arvelisse Bonilla…
Daniel Riley of RCTESTFLIGHT built a 41-inch variable pitch quadcopter using belt-drive reduction and fixed-RPM motors, measuring 18.1 g/watt in hover flight.
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