As business aviation rebounds in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, owners and operators are returning idled aircraft back into service, Cleveland-based Constant Aviation reports. 

Aircraft parked for even a few weeks often develop system issues that need to be addressed. Common issues include mechanical malfunctions, engine troubles, electrical problems and software glitches, which must be addressed before accepting passengers, the company says.

“We’ve witnessed the business aviation rebound firsthand, and it has been dramatic,” said Paul Witt, Constant Aviation vice president of AOG (Aircraft On Ground) Line Stations. “As flying has increased, our AOG division has been working at 120% capacity. That’s a big turnaround from March, when we were working at 30% capacity.”

Constant’s technicians have been spending time in hot spots, such as Northern California’s Bay Area, the Southeast and Chicago. It also added technicians in Teterboro, New Jersey, and Portland, Oregon, to handle demand in the Northeast and on the West Coast, Witt said. 

As business aviation’s recovery accelerates, so will the increase in AOG demand, he said. Witt expects the trend to continue to increase over the next few months. 

“As private aviation operators attract more flyers from the commercial airlines, they are going to find themselves flying more hours to new destinations,” Witt said. 

In responding to the coronavirus crisis, operators created a number of unique situations. For example, Constant has heard from operators who parked their aircraft in March at resort areas in the Rockies or the Southwest. 

To resume flight, “they know they need to do more than kick the tires and fire the engines, but each aircraft has different return-to-service needs,” Witt said. 

Most aircraft maintenance manuals include recommendations for items to check every two weeks during a prolonged parking. They also include information about return-to-service after a prolonged time out of operation. Operators should also be aware of any manufacturer service bulletins issued while an aircraft is out of service. 

In July, Constant Aviation also became the first provider outside of an Embraer service center to acquire tooling kits necessary to address Embraer’s most recent service bulletin, it said. Tooling can be shipped overnight anywhere in the U.S. and retrieved by a technician on the way to an idled aircraft.