From aircraft seizures to next-gen innovations and wholesale government changes, the headlines across 2025 illustrate an industry fighting to maintain its history of impeccable service as it also morphs into what aviation will become in the decades ahead. These are the stories that defined the stakes within the industry over the past year.Reservation Aircraft Seizure Sets up an Aerial Turf War
So who owns the sky and how much of it? What began as a legal dispute over aircraft repossession quickly turned into a larger conversation about sovereignty, enforcement, and who really has authority when airplanes cross tribal lines?The seizure of a 1946 Stinson 108 by the Red Lake Reservation in Minnesota, after the plane made an emergency landing, prompted the AOPA to send a letter to Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy, seeking help from the feds. Can a tribal overflight ban supersede federal authority over airspace? Stay tuned.
FULL STORY: AOPA Requests Federal Assistance to Retrieve Seized Aircraft from Reservation
Venezuelan Presidential Jet Seizure Signals a New Era of Sanctions
This seizure early in 2025 was a sort of canary in a coal mine for later in the year, and what would become US military intervention off the Venezuelan coast (including complaints from a couple of civilian pilots about military planes crossing their paths without transponders).
Officials seized a jet linked to Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro over sanctions violations, one of two Dassault Falcons taken into federal custody. The chorus of analysts from podcasts to TV insist that the current operations, those the Pentagon says are to thwart drug trafficking, echoe a refrain of this being a move by the White House to force out the Maduro regime. From aircraft to ouster – coming on top of planes shot down over Russia and GPS jamming across Europe and the Middle East – geopolitical events over the past few years have made headlines here more and more. FULL STORY: U.S. Officials Seize Venezuelan President’s Jet Over Sanction Violations
The Unleaded Fuel Transition Becomes a Full-Blown Family Argument
The move away from leaded avgas is far from settled, but by no means is it theoretical any longer. And there is plenty of positioning taking place within a wide-open market.
Don’t expect the teams at Swift Fuels or GAMI to be breaking bread at the same table any time soon. Each has challenged the other on most every front over the past year, while aviation groups have petitioned the government to slow down a couple of West Coast airports looking to completely get the lead out right away to comply with local laws.
The FAA told them to hold their horses and warned airports against selling only unleaded fuel, all of this taking place in California, where courts questioned in 2025 whether GAMI’s G100UL could realistically serve as a universal replacement.
NATA CEO Curt Castagna wrote an article exclusive to GlobalAir.com AirMail Focus – insisting that a transition will happen, but it has to be safe and coordinated.
VP Racing announced in August 2025 that its UL100E is now being tested by the FAA. The changing of the calendar now puts us four years away from the industry’s goal to be lead-free by 2030.
FULL STORIES:
FAA Warns Airports Against Selling Only Unleaded FuelJudge: GAMI G100UL Not Universal EnoughNATA CEO on Coordinated Transition – an AirMail Focus ExclusiveThe Year eVTOL Stopped Being a Science Fair Project2025 marked the year advanced air mobility leapt from the design room to the launching pad. Both Joby and Archer took to the sky and BETA went public after flying a US tour and a leg into New York’s JFK Airport.
Late in the year, the Department of Transportation unveiled the nation’s first Advanced Air Mobility strategy, signaling that regulators are no longer asking if eVTOL fits into the system but how.
Fresh off acquiring the remains of German eVTOL developer Lilium, Archer’s Legal andamp; Strategy Officer Eric Lentell spoke with GlobalAir.com at NBAA-BACE in October. We asked if 2025 had been the biggest year to date for eVTOL.
“I think from here forward, all the way to the 2030s, it’s like every year is going to be the biggest year, right?” he said. “I think next year is going to be bigger than this past year than it was the previous year.”
Still, there is plenty of paperwork to complete and red tape to cut as test flights ramp up and investor relations remain key – but the vertiports are coming, and the future is (allegedly) almost here.
FULL STORIES:
BETA Technologies Issues IPO Joby andamp; Archer Join White House ProgramDuffy Unveils New AAM StrategyFAA Aircraft Privacy Gets an Upgrade, but not All is Cut andamp; Dry
Aircraft privacy took a sharp turn in 2025, away from the Jack Sweeneys of the world, as the FAA rolled out changes to its privacy program, offering operators new options while introducing fresh uncertainty.
The updates were followed by broader discussions tied to the FAA CARES Act, leaving business aviation stakeholders parsing what data could still surface.
FULL STORIES:
New FAA Aircraft Privacy OptionFAA CARES Act Breakdown
Jets of the Future Made Real Noise, Some at Supersonic Speed
2025 kicked off with a boom – even if Boom Supersonic did not make a sonic boom in its January test flight.
And that was only one of several big achievements by the companies aiming to redefine aviation in the years to come.
Nimbus flew its N1000 hybrid-electric business jet demonstrator. And Otto Aerospace turned heads at NBAA-BACE with a reveal of its Phantom 3500 mockup on the heels of NetJets committing to a 300-aircraft order. Where can we sign up for the jet card?
FULL STORIES:
Nimbus N1000 Flight Boom Supersonic Quiet Flight Otto Aerospace Phantom 3500
The Pilot Retirement Age Debate Gets Delayed but Could ReturnThe question of whether to raise the mandatory pilot retirement age resurfaced in force, with U.S. senators pushing legislation alongside the appointment of a new ICAO ambassador.
Supporters framed the change as a practical response to pilot shortages. Critics warned of unintended safety and career-progression consequences. In the end, the extension was tabled for now, with the ICAO not adopting an extension, and the US following suit with the international body. But, with the need for pilots and high-level advocacy by people with real power, don’t expect this to be the final push.
FULL STORY: The Move to Raise Pilot Retirement Age
Bonus Depreciation Returns andamp; Aviation Accountants Rejoice
The return of 100% bonus depreciation under the House’s “Big Beautiful Bill” was one of the most consequential financial developments for aviation in 2025. It reopened the door for full first-year expensing of qualifying aircraft purchases, fundamentally altering acquisition math for businesses and owners.
However, as Suzanne Levy of the Advocate Consulting Legal Group wrote in an AirMail Focus exclusive, the benefit rewards strategy, not impulse. Expect that strategy to continue to be deployed in 2026.
FULL STORIES:
What the Big Beautiful Bill Does for Aviation Welcome Back 100% Bonus Depreciation – Now Use it Strategically
Government Reaffirms Its Grip on National Airspace
If there was a unifying theme in 2025, it was government influence pressing harder on aviation from all sides. Lawmakers floated a $315 billion air traffic control overhaul. The FAA moved to impose new restrictions on the 12 busiest U.S. airports to eek its way through the latter days of the federal government shutdown, shutting doors on private aviators and creating concern about Thanksgiving air travel.
Congress eventually scrambled to pay its bills (for now), and new legislation has advanced to ensure FAA and ATC funding during future shutdowns.
The biggest news this year at AirVenture was the announcement of MOSAIC, which came from Secretary Duffy in Oshkosh. It will expand the possibilities for sport and private pilots with expanded flight windows and business opportunities.
And that Lilium buy? Archer’s Lentell said he couldn’t get into specifics about how that aligned with Archer’s plans for MOSAIC. But he told us in October: “That opened up a potential pathway that the right people are trying to think through.”
From Washington to Oshkosh to Las Vegas, we saw clear evidence that aviation remains a national priority, and a political one.
FULL STORIES:
The ATC Overhaul Cost FAA Issues Airport Restrictions During Shutdown New FAA Funding Bill Proposed for Shutdowns MOSAIC Explained by a Pilot Duffy’s MOSAIC Announcement at AirVenture
A Year of Heartbreak and Disaster
Just after 5:30 p.m. on Nov. 4, with the sun lowering in the sky, those of us remaining in the GlobalAir.com offices worked frantically to wrap our workdays, trying to begin our drives home. That’s when the emergency alerts began blaring from our phones, announcing a shelter-in-place order and a situation at Louisville Muhammad Ali Airport (SDF).
As we were delayed from heading home, and we worked to gather and confirm facts – something that we would continue to do daily for the following week and beyond – we stared in awe at the cloud formation stretching from the ground and through the troposphere 12 miles to our west, signaling the downing at takeoff of UPS Flight 2976. Three veteran crew members tried until the final moments to save their MD-11. They, along with a dozen people on the ground, perished.That is how a year of heartbreak hit close to home for us. Unfortunately, it was a remarkably painful year for all corners of aviation around the world, as some of the field’s mightiest planes met extremely disastrous ends.
RELATED STORIES:
Aviation community mourns victims of Potomac midairThe Flight Crew of UPS Flight 2976CRJ-900 wing design may have saved lives in Toronto Delta crashIn Washington, DC, it was a regional airliner and an Army helicopter colliding midair and falling into the Potomac River near Reagan National Airport (DCA). Days later, it was a Learjet air ambulance bursting into a fireball in a Philadelphia neighborhood. In Toronto, it was a mysterious miracle when a CRJ arriving from Minneapolis rolled upside down with no fatalities. Globally, an Air India crash at takeoff remains short of answers on why a fuel cutoff switch was activated, while in South Korea, airport infrastructure took the brunt of the blame in a commercial air disaster.
After analysts input the numbers into spreadsheets for the history books, it will not be only the casualties in 2025 – and the scale at which they happened – that will resonate in the years to come. Hopefully, the investigations of each lead to safer airports and a safer sky. It’s expected that final reports from the NTSB on the Potomac collision and UPS disaster will urge sweeping changes.At a crossroads where the aviation future is rapidly arriving, with more autonomy and AI expected, the human element remains the most important part of all of it. May we see a safer 2026 and beyond. And may we find answers in the rubble that prevent future heartbreak and disaster.
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