Literally going out in a blaze of glory, the Galileo spacecraft’s atmospheric probe separates from the orbiter and plunges into Jupiter’s atmosphere. The probe sends a stream of data back to the orbiter and manages to survive 58.5 minutes before it is crushed by the intense pressure. Galileo was launched from the space shuttle in 1989.
Bell Textron has won DARPA's contest for a no-runway, high-speed drone that will prove out technologies useful for special operations forces and possibly the Air Force's Agile Combat Employment concept. Bell's design converts a tiltrotor to a jet-powered aircraft able to fly at up to 450 knots.