Bird-X, Incorporated has inroduced the UX-4 system that the company claims keeps birds away from hangars and their environs within 6,500 feet. Four Piezo ceramic speakers project powerful ultrasonic waves in an overlapping fan pattern for 360-degree coverage. Birds are irritated by the sound, but are not harmed in any way. (Human beings within earshot remain unflappable since they can't hear the din.) Speaker sequencing, frequency and warble rate are adjustable. The UX-4 uses a 110-VAC outlet. Price: $475. Bird-X, Inc. 300 N. Elizabeth St., Dept. BCA, Chicago, IL 60607.
Access to Narita Airport (RJAA) is worsening, possibly due to backlash from external pressure. (The NBAA and other organizations appealed to the U.S. Embassy to help ease airport restrictions to allow more corporate activity.) Handlers say some access still is possible but advise making reservations early.
Historically, most mid-size business aircraft have been powered by growth versions of turbofans originally designed for light-jet aircraft. Many of these derivative engines have been pushed to the edge of their design envelope, resulting in shortfalls in climb and cruise performance, plus increased maintenance cost.
Airline Educational Services offers a crew resource management video program designed for corporate aviation and for Part 121 and 135 certificate holders. This 12-hour, stand-alone video course consists of a master student guide, an instructor's manual, exercise materials and 10 videotapes. Course content follows FAA guidelines (from Advisory Circular 121-51A) and includes information on team building, information transfer, decision making, problem solving, conflict resolution, maintaining situational awareness and stress management. Introductory price: $6,500.
The California Supreme Court upheld a lower court's decision to overturn a $57-million damage award against Raytheon Aircraft in a lawsuit related to a 1974 Beech Travel Air crash that killed all four persons aboard. The Supreme Court's ruling lets stand an appeals court's decision that the manufacturer (Beech) and its insurer did not act in bad faith by going to trial rather than by settling the original lawsuit. The NTSB attributed the cause of the crash to pilot error.
Mitsubishi Heavy Industries became the fourth major participant in the de Havilland Dash 8-400 regional airline project when it signed on to design and build the fuselage and tail sections of the 70-seat twin-engine propjet. Other major vendors include Pratt&Whitney to provide the PW150-series engines, Dowty Aerospace for the six-blade, all-composite propellers and Menasco for the landing gear. First flight of the Dash 8-400 is scheduled for late 1997.
National Air Transportation Association (NATA) has contracted with the Aviation Research Group/U.S. to better monitor the sales trends of the air taxi and FBO industries. NATA hopes its General Aviation Business Barometer will be able to obtain sales statistics on a monthly basis for fuel, flight-training hours, maintenance and charter flights. A sample of NATA members will provide data on monthly sales figures to Cincinnati-based ARG/U.S. for compilation and reporting.
Gregory L. Summe, former senior vice president of AlliedSignal General Aviation Avionics, is the new president of AlliedSignal Engines. Meanwhile, Chuck Miller, president of AlliedSignal Commercial Avionics, has assumed responsibility for General Aviation Avionics.
Almost half of the U.S.-based business aircraft that head for European destinations stop in the London area. Therefore, we offer an update on business airports and services available in that region (See also ``London's Bridges,'' July 1993, page 78).
The rest of the world is slated to start using ICAO Meteorological Aviation Weather Report (METAR) codes on January 1, 1996, but the United States will delay implementation until June 1996. Due to the high volume of Canada/U.S. traffic, Canada also will postpone its transition to June 1996, although it is able to meet the January date. For an FAA booklet about the METAR codes, phone the agency in Washington, D.C. at (202) 267-7770, or fax (202) 366-7083.
Before the 1995-1996 winter season officially begins on December 22, the FAA may finish a study of the icing characteristics of 18 types of turboprop commuter aircraft and issue new restrictions under which some of these aircraft can fly. The study resulted from the FAA's investigation into the October 31, 1994 crash of an Aerospatiale ATR-72 in Roselawn, Indiana (B/CA, May, page 18). Meanwhile, the FAA issued a proposed AD that would further tighten icing equipment and operation rules for the Aerospatiale Model ATR-42 and ATR-72 series.
New Falcon Jet aircraft now come with a 10-year/10,000-hour airframe warranty that is no longer pro-rated in years six through 10. Dassault Falcon Jet also has removed from warranty the exclusion for defects caused by corrosion. Other warranty coverages remain unchanged-five years or 5,000 hours on other specified components and all standard avionics; one year or 1,000 hours on interior completion and exterior paint; and six months or 500 hours on maintenance labor.
David Walter Thissell, founder of the Northeast Aircraft Maintenance Corporation of Plymouth, Massachusetts, was selected as the General Aviation Maintenance Technician for 1995, and Evelyn A. Carlson, with Sunrise Aviation of Santa Ana, California, was chosen as Flight Instructor of the Year. These annual awards are sponsored by the AOPA Air Safety Foundation, the FAA, GAMA, National Air Transportation Association, NBAA, National Association of Flight Instructors and Professional Aviation Maintenance Association.
Guide for Private Flyers is published by the U.S. Customs Service. This 110-page booklet outlines customs procedures for private aircraft. The guide also includes a listing, by state, of airports at which customs service is available, as well as hours of operation and notice requirements at each customs facility. Also included are the applicable portions of the U.S. customs regulations, plus samples of the most commonly used customs forms.
A Northwest Airlines DC-10 bound from Detroit to Frankfurt, Germany mistakenly landed in Brussels, Belgium-some 165 nm from Frankfurt-and the crew apparently was the last to know about the error.
Editor's Note: Elsewhere in this issue, you'll find an article by B/CA Special Features writer Dan Manningham on ice-induced roll-control problems. Much of the research Manningham discusses has been accomplished in universities around the nation, including the University of Wyoming-where atmospheric researchers have been penetrating ice-making clouds for over three decades.
As I write to you this month, NTSB officials are drafting recommendations that would open the way for aviation-industry worker-history sharing. And-on the flip side-the Air Line Pilots Association is lobbying all who will listen against the notion that aviation employers deserve to know how prospective line pilots and other safety-critical workers performed in their last jobs.
There is no such thing as one appropriate spares kit for all airplanes. For example, Gulfstream pilots told B/CA that support in the United Kingdom and Western Europe is so good that they frequently carry only a few cans of engine oil or possibly a spare electrical control unit. If, however, you're going to be the first crew to fly a newly certificated aircraft to one of the smaller airports in Europe, you might want to pack along some spares.
Comments are due December 15 on ``Challenge 2000,'' the FAA's self-evaluation of its regulation, certification and enforcement role (B/CA, August, page 15). The agency wants comments on such questions as: Do the FAA's current functions provide an adequate level of safety? What specific changes are needed in the FAA's mission over the next decade? In the coming decade, in what areas should the FAA devote fewer or greater resources, and why? For further details, phone (202) 267-7947.
FAR Part 91 operators need look no further than FAR Part 135.167 to find a list of recommended survival equipment for extended overwater operations: (1) An approved life preserver equipped with an approved survivor locator light easily accessible to each occupant of the aircraft. (2) Enough approved life rafts of a rated capacity and buoyancy to accommodate the occupants of the aircraft.
National Air Transportation Association, Helicopter Association International and others are questioning the FAA about rules adopted late in 1994 to require adherence to the FARs by ``public'' aircraft (government-owned or -leased) used for carrying passengers (B/CA, April, page 26). NATA believes the FAA is granting too many exemptions that will render the law ``meaningless.'' The HAI says it has received ``numerous'' reports of public-service operators ignoring the intent of the law.
NTSB is expected to recommend that a pilot's work history, detailing his or her skills and proficiencies, be shared by the former or present employer airline with the prospective-employer airline when the pilot changes jobs, and that pilot job-applicants be required to waive the right to sue on the basis of that sharing. The anticipated recommendations stem from the investigation of the crash of an American Eagle Jetstream 31 in December 1994.
Germany's Daimler-Benz Aerospace (DASA), facing billions of dollars in losses since 1992, will implement job cuts and close some facilities in an attempt to restore profitability by the end of 1998. The labor force of DASA (including Dornier, but excluding DASA subsidiary Fokker, which earlier announced a 1,700-person reduction) will fall to 40,271 employees in 1998, down from 49,093 this month and 60,082 in December 1994.
Pacific Southwest Airlines flies anew-well, sort of. Following its earlier policy of keeping the names of its airline acquisitions alive, USAir has formally changed the name of its Jetstream International Airlines subsidiary to PSA Airlines Inc. Previously, Pennsylvania Airlines was merged with Suburban Airlines and renamed Allegheny Commuter, and the name of Henson Aviation was changed to Piedmont.
