Business & Commercial Aviation

Piper Aircraft has taken a firm order for 50 Piper Archer single-engine aircraft from China Air Shuttle. Deliveries are scheduled to begin in the second quarter of 2017.

328 Support Services GmbH and Duncan Aviation have partnered to deliver and certify a full cabin completion on a Bombardier Challenger 604.

Executive AirShare, the Lenexa, Kansas-based fractional aircraft provider, has moved into hangar and office space at Col. James Jabara Airport in northeast Wichita from Wichita Dwight D. Eisenhower National Airport in west Wichita.

The FAA has issued new rules that make it easier and cheaper for certain recreational general aviation pilots to gain required medical certifications to fly.

The FAA is proposing a dozen new high-altitude jet routes along the U.S. East Coast as part of a modernization strategy to replace legacy ground-referenced routes with GPS-supported, performance-based navigation routes.

Italian helicopter maker Leonardo-Finmeccanica is finding eager buyers among the Chinese. The company reports that it has sold more than 180 helicopters of various types to operators there.

In December, FAA issued its final rule on the new Part 23 which is intended to reduce the time and cost to certificate aircraft under 19,000 lb.

Air Methods Corp. has acquired three Airbus H145 helicopters for hospital-based air medical transport, to replace older aircraft now in service.

LifePort, a Sikorsky company, has received FAA airworthiness certification for its Patient Loading Utility System for Pilatus PC-12/47 and PC-12/47E aircraft.

Take some time to put together a plan that offers the opportunity for you and your flight team to gain additional knowledge and continue to grow your operation’s safety culture.

For the business aviation community, at once both a broad but thin and rarefied sliver of society and the body politic, the way forward is rife with questions, opportunities and concerns.

David Sneed discusses the scope and operations of Delta Private Jets, which provides charter and jet card services to companies and individuals.

Business aviation professionals say they are optimistic about the Middle East private jet market, a new survey shows. In research from Global Jet Capital, a provider of financing for corporate aircraft, 59% of 200 business aviation professionals surveyed said the Middle East private jet market is currently attractive for finance companies, while 15% say it is unattractive. Over the next three years, 41% of those surveyed said they expect the market to become more attractive, while 13% said they believe it will become less appealing.

StandardAero is offering global high-speed broadband connectivity for the business aviation market for Falcon aircraft. Working with Honeywell’s new JetWave Ka-band system, the cabin completion and MRO facility has completed an STC for the Falcon 900B, C and EX series, as well as for the Falcon 50 series. The new system was first fitted for a Falcon 900EX operator. Documentation has also been submitted for European Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) validation.

BCA shares news of the latest products and services for the business aviation industry.

Quintus Technologies has been selected by Gulfstream Aerospace to provide a high-pressure fluid cell press. The Flexform press will go to Gulfstream's Mexicali, Mexico, facility, which produces wiring harnesses, sheet metal components, subassemblies and machine parts, Quintus said. “The Flexform process requires only one rigid tool half; the other tool half is a flexible rubber diaphragm under uniform hydrostatic pressure,” the company says.

Astronics Corp. has been selected as a supplier for Textron Aviation's new Cessna Denali single-engine turboprop. Astronics will supply an aircraft power system that features Astronics’ Corepower Induction Starter Generator System and Corepower Electronic Circuit Breaker Unit and the 28-Volt DC Empower In-Seat Power Supply. The Empower in-seat power systems allow passengers to simultaneously use and charge multiple personal electronic devices in the air. The Denali’s first flight is expected in 2018.

West Star Aviation has received a supplemental type certificate for the installation of a Future Air Navigation System (FANS) Controller Pilot Data Link Communications application on Dassault Falcon 900B aircraft. The application updates and supplements current communications equipment and allows direct exchange of text-based messages between the controller and pilot and improves communication capabilities in areas that usually require third-party HF communication relay such as oceanic and en route airspace.

The first phase of a three-part modernization of Terminal 3 at Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport was completed Dec. 6. It includes a new atrium and museum gallery. Targeted for completion by early 2019, Phase 2 of the project will create a 15-gate south concourse with new food and retail areas. Phase 3, to be completed in 2020, will involve the demolition and construction of a new north concourse.

The Citation Mustang, introduced at the 2002 NBAA Convention by then-Cessna Chairman and CEO Russ Meyer, was marketed as a sure-thing alternative to the new class of very light jets (VLJs) that were all the rage at the turn of the 21st century.

To help mark and celebrate its half-century in business, Jet Aviation has adopted a new logo, a stand-alone, circular monogram with the word JET to replace the deer head with which it has long been identified. “We wanted the new logo and branding initiative to visually reflect the strength and stability of our trusted brand name as we turn to face and welcome future opportunities,” explained Heinz Aebi, Jet’s senior vice president of Group Marketing and Communications.

GI Aviation has earned an air operator's certificate from the UAE General Civil Aviation Authority to enable the start of commercial flights with its fleet of Pilatus PC-12NG aircraft in the Gulf region. GI Aviation has been working to begin new entry-level service for business aviation in the region, which has been dominated by larger business jets. GI Aviation worked with Hendell Aviation in Finland to help it obtain the air operator’s certificate.

Jet-A and avgas per-gallon fuel prices—December 2016

Marco Tulio Pellegrini, CEO of Embraer Executive Jets, believes that for business aviation to break free of its nearly decade-long slump it needs to change the way it operates. Accordingly, Embraer is proposing a business model in which leasing companies buy business aircraft to lease to charter companies that then operate scheduled point-to-point services between cities with high business-passenger traffic.

AeroBrigham, based in Decatur, Texas, has taken delivery of a Bell 407 configured for medical mission flights. It is the fourth aircraft on which the company has completed paint, interior, avionics and airframe improvements and performed maintenance and component overhauls. The work was done for Survival Flight, a Part 135 air medical transport provider. AeroBrigham will begin work on another 407 for Survival Flight before year-end.