Finally! The world’s first permitted cell phone call has been made on an Emirates flight between Dubai and Casablanca.

In order to allow calls, the airline fitted a plane with a system designed by AeroMobile that prevents mobile phones from interfering with the aircraft’s electronics. Emirates also had to obtain approval from international air safety organizations.

The company said that it decided to introduce the ability to use cell phones after seeing high demand for the phones installed in seats.

Of course, this might not be such good news for those who like to sleep on flights. However, Emirates is letting the cabin crew have the final say over cell phone usage, and the system will prevent calls at night to keep disturbances to a minimum.

Emirates plans to extend the system to more planes and add BlackBerry and other data services. Hopefully this is the beginning of a trend, as being able to use a cell phone (in moderation) would be very convenient during flights. [via BBC]

The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) will soon award a contract for development of an unmanned aircraft that is capable of staying in the air for up to five years at a time.

DARPA’s project, called Vulture, aims to create a craft that can fly uninterrupted over an area for extended periods of time while performing intelligence, surveillance, reconnaissance, and communication missions. Read more »

British engineers are working on an airplane design dubbed the A2 and affectionately named the “Son of Concorde.” The aircraft would fly at twice the speed of the old Concorde and at five times the speed of sound.

The engineers believe that this is the future of modern air travel. The A2 would fly with a top speed of 3,400mph and be able to take 300 passengers between London and Sydney in under five hours. Its engines are powered by liquid hydrogen and produce few carbon emissions, making this plane much greener than the ones we have today.

Of course, the plane is loud as ever. The A2 would have to fly just under Mach 1 until it reached unpopulated areas at which point it would crank the engines to their full Mach 5 capabilities.

The aircraft is fast, green, and looks great. Can we ask for anything else? We hope that the design comes to life so we can hop on one of these for our next international trip.

It looks like we have another concept gadget riding on the e-paper craze. TicketTime aims to fix time zone problems by having the correct time at your destination preset on a thin, detachable watch when you pick up your boarding pass.

The watch comes off of the boarding pass and can be worn around your wrist like a normal wristwatch, or it can stay attached if you prefer. It also doubles as your return ticket and is returned to the airline during check-in.

TicketTime would eliminate the need to change time zones on your cell phone or regular wristwatch and would be a great help for frequent travelers. Unfortunately, we don’t see this one becoming a reality as it seems just a wee bit more expensive than a plain old paper ticket.

[Via DVICE, SlipperyBrick]

A video of an extremely small personal helicopter has surfaced. You just sit on a little chair under the helicopter and it takes you into the skies.

Although it looks incredibly fun to fly, the sound and look of those rotors right above your head means we won’t be getting on one anytime soon.

Video after the jump. Read more »

Here comes another nifty gadget from Yanko Design. Although just a concept, this Flying Stick camera seems very feasible.

The Flying Stick camera stores energy when it’s rubbed between your palms and, when released, uses that energy to fly into the air and take pictures at a set interval.

It would also have face recognition technology which would know where to focus to take the perfect pictures of you (or anybody else) from above.

I’m thinking 4 megapixels and a gigabyte or two of memory and they’ve got a seller. More pics after the jump. Read more »

Richard Branson showcased today a model of the spaceship he hopes will be the first to take passengers into space on a regular basis. The SpaceShipTwo, as it is dubbed, will begin test flights later this year.

“Two thousand eight is going to be the year of the spaceship. We’re excited about this, and everything it will do,” said Branson.

Virgin Galactic, part of Branson’s Virgin Group, already has 200 people signed up and $30 million in deposits for the rides. What does a flight into space cost you? A measly $200,000. The trips are expected to take about two and a half hours with five minutes of weightlessness.

Let’s hope they get this thing perfected soon so that prices can start falling. I, for one, am excited for a vacation to the moon. Pics after the jump. Read more »