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Awesome video on how Lockheed Martin uses to laser to paint the F-35.

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This is Boeing's "Phantom Eye," a hydrogen-powered, unmanned spy plane that flies 65,000 feet above the ground and can fly for four days straight. Boeing hails it as the "first of its kind" — its looks alone set it apart for that honor.

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Most people associate drones with the large unmanned aircraft carrying out airstrikes and surveillance missions over Afghanistan and Pakistan. But here at an industry conference for the U.S. military's "secret warriors" -- the special operations community -- the increasing focus is on small, stealthy drones that can swoop in and spy on potential enemies. And perhaps even kill them.

These sorts of drones don't typically require specially trained operators or cumbersome ground control stations. Nor, as is often the case with larger surveillance drones, do they require troops to wait hours to receive critical information transmitted from faraway intelligence centers. Rather, these unmanned aerial vehicles, or UAVs, provide immediate imagery and intelligence to the people who need them most: soldiers on the ground. 

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The Homeland Security Department will use unmanned surveillance aircraft and other technological upgrades in its ongoing effort to protect the southern border of the United States.

The department said Wednesday it has obtained Federal Aviation Administration permission to operate unmanned planes along the Texas border and throughout the Gulf Coast region. Customs and Border Protection will base a surveillance drone at the Corpus Christi Naval Air Station in Texas.

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It’s not everyday you see one of these cruise through the harbor—or docked at the local marina. That’s because Cosmic Muffin, the “boat” you see in the photo on the left, is a true one of a kind: At one time, she was a 1939 Boeing 307 Stratoliner airplane complete with wings, tail, and cockpit, and she actually flew. (The 307 was the first commercial pressurized aircraft and a variant of the B-17 Flying Fortress. Only ten 307s were built, all in the late-1930’s. Production was stopped at the outbreak of war in Europe in September 1939.) For more than 20 years, Cosmic Muffin was a houseboat for her proud liveaboard owner, David Drimmer. Today she rests dockside in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, open to the public for touring or chartering. But the story of how she came to be what she is today is even weirder than her looks.

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MiG pilot retracts landing gear too soon

Pogo in storage at the Garber Restoration circa 1990's

The Convair XFY Pogo tailsitter was an experiment in vertical takeoff and landing. The Pogo had delta wings and three-bladed contra-rotating propellers powered by a 5,500 hp Allison YT40-A-16 turboprop engine. It was intended to be a high-performance fighter aircraft capable of operating from small warships. Landing the XFY-1 was difficult as the pilot had to look over his shoulder while carefully working the throttle to land.

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June 2, 1954: A Convair XFY-1 Pogo aircraft makes a vertical takeoff and landing. It’s a milestone in the checkered history of VTOL aircraft.

Using designs captured from the Germans, the Navy and the newly formed Air Force crafted two design studies in 1947 for creating a fixed-wing vertical-takeoff-and-landing, or VTOL, aircraft. The goal of the project was to build a fighter that could protect convoys but not require a large landing area.

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