EDGERTON, KS—Aerospace supplier Triumph Group has opened a new assembly plant here. The 156,000-square-foot factory will produce a variety of components, including landing gear, seat and cargo tracks, floor beams, thrust reverser beams, stringer end fittings, wing attach fittings, installation brackets, hinge arm assemblies and engine inlet assemblies.

This time of the year, many homeowners in the Midwest and Northeast start covering their barbecue grills, patio furniture, rosebushes and swimming pools. The type of cover they choose can make a big difference in how those objects survive cold winter temperatures and heavy snow.

BROUGHTON, UK—Like a cartoon space alien with a dome-like skull, an Airbus Beluga transport plane arriving from Madrid drops from the sky above this village 200 miles northwest of London and taxis to a stop with its front end tucked inside a large building off the runway. Its bulbous forehead pops open to disgorge massive wing panels—98 feet long and 20 feet wide—that will soon be assembled by sophisticated robots and about 800 people into the largest carbon-fiber composite wings now built for commercial aviation.

It is rare for CEOs of competing airlines to be passengers on the same flight. But, that’s exactly what happened June 3, 2016, on SWISS Airlines’ flight BBA505, from Dublin to Zurich.

NORTON SHORES, MI—Johnson Technology will add 100 jobs and invest $14.5 million in a third Muskegon-area aviation engine manufacturing facility.

OAK RIDGE, TN—Engineers at Oak Ridge National Laboratory have created the world’s largest solid 3D-printed structure. Measuring 17.5 feet long, 5.5 feet wide and 1.5 feet tall, the structure is a trim-and-drill fixture for manufacturing a component of the Boeing 777X passenger jet.

Welding of one sort or another has been the No. 1 application for industrial robots almost since the technology was invented.

NASA spokespeople frequently tell the public that space exploration is not for the faint of heart. But, this type of work is also not for the impatient.

SEATTLE—Joe Sutter, the Boeing Co. engineer who ushered in the modern era of long-range travel by spearheading the 747 jumbo jet in the 1960s, died this week. He was 95.

BEIJING—China’s first domestic manufacturer of jet engines, Aero Engine Corp. of China, has officially opened for business. The multibillion dollar conglomerate will employ some 100,000 people and incorporate subsidiaries of various state-owned firms, including the Aviation Industrial Corp. of China.