Researchers at at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology have been working since the 1990s on helicopters that can navigate indoor spaces autonomously. This one won the 2009 AUVSI Aerial Robotics Competition. Laser scanners and cameras allow it to move through a building on its own. Potential applications include industrial inspection and disaster rescue in hazardous locations.

Contest Page via Popular Science

Reporter and former Green Beret Michael Yon took a series of intriguing photos of glowing rotor blades as a helicopter lands in a military base in Afghanistan. The eerie "halo" is caused by static electricity generated as the titanium/nickel blades move through a field of dust (which is kicked up from the ground as the heli lands).

The phenomenon, striking as it is, has no name – and Michael decided to name it the Kopp-Etchells Effect, as a tribute, after Corporal Benjamin Kopp and Corporal Joseph Etchells, who died in battle.

The full story at Michael’s blog: Link via TYWKIWDBI

He made it out of wood and a motorcycle engine:

20 year old Chinese farmer Wu Zhongyuan built himself a helicopter using only — according to the man — what he remembers of middle school physics lessons and “relevant knowledge [found while] surfing the Internet via my mobile phone.”

Well, sure looks like things worked out. His single-seater conveyance has blades made from the wood of an Elm tree, a frame reinforced with steel pipes and uses an engine from a motorcycle — all for around $1,600. Wu claims the ‘copter can get him as high as 2,600 feet, though it seems he’s grounded for the time being as the Chinese government has forbid him to fly because of safety reasons.

Link via Geekologie

Keith Loutit’s work has been presented on Neatorama in the past in “A Lilliputian World” and in “A Little Mardi-Gras” and each time it blew people away. Using his impressive skill with tilt-shift photography and filming he pumps out videos and pictures that present the illusion of miniatures brought to life. In this video Keith got to film a rescue training session with the Westpac Rescue Helicopter Service.

More of Keith’s stuff here – Link

In 1976, Patricia Renick created this awesome sculpture of the dinosaur Triceratop out of real helicopter parts:

Completed in 1976 as the Vietnam war wound down, it serves largely as a plea for the extinction of military technology. 30 feet long, the fearsome sculpture combines life sized helicopter and Triceratops parts, featuring genuine blades and weapons. [...]

Triceracopter could be placed in multiple traditions. It is a form of social commentary on killing machines and an expression of hope for the end of warfare. There are many artists who are working with the idea of bio-mechanical forms, juxtapositions and transformations.

Link

From the Upcoming ueue, submitted by JJA.

Update 1/15/09 by Alex: Let’s do this instead – a thumbnail with a link to the video clip. It’s a fascinating excerpt from the IMAX movie Straight Up: Helicopters in Action

However, staff could not find any trace of either the helicopter or the package which it appeared to be carrying underneath it when they searched the Category C jail.

‘Using a mini-helicopter to get contraband into jails is unprecedented. When officers spotted it they nearly fell off their chairs’, a prison source told the Sun.

‘It could have been drugs or a mobile phone in the package. It is possible it was a dummy run.’

Maybe the helicopter flew out as well. Link -via Unique Daily

This guy has skills. I once tried a RC helicopter once and the results were disastrous. To be able to manipulate all theses servos takes great skills and this dude demonstrates it with the neat clip.
Those moves defy Newton’s Laws of Motion…even at that scale.
Enjoy!

Link: YouTube

This is probably the world’s smallest personal helicopters. Unfortunately I don’t have any information on the designers of these flying toys but it sure would be nice to have one.

Videos: Dailymotion; Youtube