India celebrated its 74th Republic Day on January 26 this year with great spirit and fervour! The occasion was marked by a spectacular air display with 50 aircraft and helicopters of the three forces - Air, Navy, and Army. This included 45 aircraft of the Air Force, one from the Navy, and four helicopters of the Army exhibiting their professional flying skills. Inside this issue, we have a compilation of the aircraft during the flypast showing the various formations in which they flew.

Technological advancements in design, structure, features as well as capabilities are speedily transforming the future of the aerospace and defence industry. This edition looks at some of those new launches and training methods on the technology side of the industry. For instance, Northrop Grumman and the US Air Force unveiled the B-21 Raider, the first new, long-range strike bomber in a generation and an aircraft specifically designed to be the multifunctional backbone of the modernised bomber fleet. While the B-21 isn’t expected to be operational and introduced into service for several more years, the formal unveiling ceremony is a significant milestone in the US Air Force’s effort to modernise combat capabilities. A detailed report on the same by Rohit Goel is part of this issue. This edition also looks at Embraer’s military force multiplier, the C-390 Millenium and the KC-390 variant in a report by Ayushee Chaudhary. Continuing the military fervour, Group Captain D.K. Pandey (Retd) analyses China and Pakistan’s “Joint Fighter-17” (JF-17). The single-engine, multi-role fighter of Pakistan Air Force (PAF) is looking for buyers. He looks at some false claims, issues with PAF JF-17, the impact of Russia-Ukraine war and the anticipated capabilities of the modernisation programme.

In another article Air Vice Marshal Sanjay Bhatnagar (Retd) looks at some of the critical deficiencies with IAF and the need to develop the capability to fight and win tomorrow’s wars, highlighting that multi-domain operations and hybrid warfare are here to stay, as indicated by the Chief of the Air Staff as well. This edition also looks back at the first supersonic aircraft, the Bell X-1.

Touching upon technological training, Air Marshal Sukhchain Singh (Retd) writes about simulator technology that is advancing particularly in computer technology during the last twenty years, majorly impacting flight simulation. Looking at flight simulators for commercial as well as business aircraft, this issue of the magazine also states the growing demand for simulators that can be re-configured or possibly be upgraded to support newer aircraft models. Another article by Rohit Goel underlines some of the leading flight simulators for commercial and general aviation along with the need to make training more efficient for the younger pilots growing up in a digital age.

This edition also covers a detailed report on CFM LEAP Family by Joseph Noronha. Looking at the LEAP engine’s journey, he highlights that within a short span of time LEAP has become the second most ordered jet engine ever, lagging only its predecessor, the CFM56.

All this and more in this issue of SP’s Aviation. Welcome aboard and we wish you many happy landings!