CURRENT ISSUE
November 2012
Features
The Flying Emergency Room
One reason more soldiers are making it home alive.
Printed in Space
If your star tracker breaks on the way to the moon, just hit Command P.
Cuba During the Missile Crisis
Fifty years later, Cubans remember preparing to fight the Americans.
Restoration: Carpenter’s Special
De Havilland D.H.98 Mosquito
Ode to the Bubble
The Bell 47, famous as the star of “Whirlybirds,” was the DC-3 of helicopters. Could it make a comeback?
Pint-Size Sky Watchers
While monster telescopes get the attention, the little guys quietly — and cheaply — rack up cosmic finds.
And the Oscar Goes to... the Airplane!
Some of the airplanes that loom largest in our collective memory have flown only in the movies
Who Was Fatty Pearson?
A World War II British foot soldier’s best friend in the air, and the man who rescued Ernest Hemingway.
Departments
The Smithsonian Roadshow
Can’t make it to the Museum? There might be an artifact on loan right in your neighborhood.
Home Sweet Duralumin
A Buckminster Fuller design was grounded in aerospace technology.
Flying in Comfort
75 years ago, the Army Air Corps’ XC-35 launched the pressurized cabin.