In Pictures: Top Aerospace & Defense Stories, Feb. 14 2023

Credit: NASA. Demand for conducting experiments on board the International Space Station (ISS) National Laboratory remains strong after 75 payloads were sent to the orbiting platform last year.

Credit: Dassault Aviation, C. Cosmao. Motivated primarily by fractious relationships with neighbors China and Pakistan, India possesses the fourth largest air force in the world with a total of 1,912 aircraft currently in service. 

Credit: Joby Aviation. Joby Aviation announced that it has begun final assembly of its first partially-conforming S4 electric vertical takeoff and landing (eVTOL) air taxi.

Credit: U.S. government. While the U.S. and Canadian governments have still not recovered debris from three high-altitude objects downed by fighter jets within the past several days, the leading explanation is that they were “benign” objects tied to a commercial or other civilian purpose, officials say.

Credit: U.S. Army. The U.S. sees a diplomatic and industrial opportunity in the number of countries looking for alternatives to their existing Russian-built platforms that have become difficult to maintain since the start of the Russia-Ukraine war.

Credit: Thales UK. The UK Royal Navy is set to operate Schiebel’s Camcopter rotary-wing uncrewed aircraft system (UAS) from its Type 23 frigates as part of meeting the service’s latest urgent capability requirement.

Credit: Ministry of National Defense of the Republic of Poland. Poland is preparing to begin surveillance flights with General Atomics MQ-9A Reaper uncrewed aircraft systems (UAS).