Whatever your motivation it is clear that your intent in reporting on David Sokol's resignation (AWIN, March 31) was to besmirch his character. There is not one iota of evidence suggesting insider trading by Sokol; get your facts straight prior to launching a tirade. While you may be building a résumé that will have your considered for employment by NBC, the New York Times or CNN, reporting honestly and fairly would serve mankind far better than your guttersniping.
StandardAero Business Aviation says it is the first maintenance, repair and overhaul (MRO) provider certified to perform the installation of Honeywell's Primus Elite flight deck system in Falcon 900C and 900EX aircraft. The recently issued STC enables StandardAero to replace five aging CRT cockpit displays with five modern, integrated, state-of-the-art Honeywell Primus Elite (DU-875) LCD units. The retrofit can be performed at any one of StandardAero's four facilities: Springfield, Ill.; Augusta, Ga.; Houston or Los Angeles.
FAA Flight Standards Director John Allen calls concerns over potential GPS jamming “a very, very big issue right now.” The FAA is working with the Federal Communications Commission on the potential ramifications of the recent conditional approval for LightSquared to provide terrestrial broadband services using frequencies reserved for mobile satellite communication. The agency “is all over this,” he says, adding, “They're in the middle of a food fight right now.”
American Eurocopter announced that Air Medical Resource Group signed an agreement to buy three AS350 B3e helicopters with options for four more, making it the U.S. launch customer for the updated version of the AStar family. The AS350 B3e has a more-powerful Turbomeca Arriel 2D turboshaft engine with FADEC. Certification is planned this summer, with deliveries before year-end, the company said.
Air Partner’s advice for a successful evacuation: Analyze risk — how likely is it that you may need to evacuate staff; is there political unrest or volcanic activity in the area? Have a planned exit strategy. Ensure your staff know the drill and have practiced it. Engage a professional organization to carry out the evacuation.
Insufficient funding at FAA could curtail product development and slow job recovery Cessna’s chairman, CEO and president Jack Pelton told the House Subcommittee on Commerce, Manufacturing and Trade, March 16. “Unless the FAA is provided adequate resources, and implements new processes and procedures to streamline the certification process, we believe it will not be able to keep up with service demand by manufacturers and this will severely diminish the competitiveness of U.S.
I just read Mike Gamauf’s “The Reluctant Aviator” (Flight Log, March 2011, page 68) and I really enjoyed it. The time spent with his father, I’m sure, was priceless. His description of wanting to fly for the Army was exactly what I went through as well. After four years as a Huey crew chief I went on to college and Air Force ROTC, where they were more lenient on eyesight restrictions (correctable to 20/20). Unfortunately, timing was not on my side when I commissioned (148 AFROTC pilot slots for the nation).
Led by Europe, demand for civil helicopters is showing signs of recovery, and deliveries in the 2011-15 period will be 5% higher than over the last five years, at 4,200 to 4,400 rotorcraft, projects Honeywell. A survey of more than 1,000 chief pilots and flight department managers operating 2,150 helicopters worldwide showed a 2% increase in their five-year fleet replacement and expansion plans. Although modest, this ends two years of declining demand, Honeywell says. Planned fleet utilization also increased in almost all regions.
The first approaches using Europe’s EGNOS satellite navigation system were flown into Pau Pyrénées Airport in France by a Dassault Falcon 900LX equipped with EASy II, the second generation of Dassault’s flight deck system. EGNOS augments the accuracy and integrity of the U.S. GPS satellite system to within one meter horizontally and two meters vertically, allowing LPV (Localizer Performance with Vertical Guidance) approaches down to 250-ft. minimums.
Eurocopter booked 68 new orders and agreements comprising eight of its helicopter models from operators in the United States, Canada, Europe and Russia during Heli-Expo 2011. New business concluded during the March industry event in Orlando, Fla., included the EC145 T2 unveiled at the show, which won a total of 17 launch commitments. The upgraded version of Eurocopter’s EC145 incorporates a Fenestron tail rotor, more-powerful Arriel 2E turboshaft engines, a new avionics suite and a four-axis autopilot.
Dassault says its sales and business aircraft deliveries will fall this year, with uncertainty over when the market will properly recover. Although there has been a slowdown in order cancellations and a slight uptick in order activity in the business aviation market, company president Charles Edelstenne said that the uncertain macroeconomic environment makes it difficult to predict how quickly the market will rebound.
As mentioned in the main text, U.S. Customs and Border Protection no longer confers “permission to proceed” authority to aircraft entering U.S. territory at Adak Island in the Aleutian Chain. Previously, aircraft using Adak as a tech stop on the way back from Asia could arrange to take on fuel at Adak, then with prior arrangement, proceed to Anchorage to clear Customs. Here, courtesy of Universal Weather & Aviation, is the two-part message received last year from CBP:
Eight furloughed pilots have been recalled in the company’s move to address growth as business recovers. FlightOptions is expanding its fleet of Phenom 300, 400XT and Citation X aircraft, along with its capacity for fractional and jet card programs. FlightOptions now employs 311 pilots.
Since 1993, the FAA has prohibited executives from reimbursing their companies for personal use of company aircraft. The genesis of this policy was a legal interpretation requested on behalf of Charles Schwab. The FAA took a very narrow view of FAR Part 91.501(b)(5), concluding that the rule was designed to allow reimbursement for business flights, and therefore personal flights were not covered. Simply stated, the man named Charles Schwab could not write a check to Charles Schwab & Co. Inc. for a personal flight in the company airplane.
I savor reading Cause & Circumstance. It’s usually the first read for me when I get the publication. “A Failed Culture of Safety” (February 2011) was quite fascinating, but it left me feeling as if I’d watched an episode of “Hawaii Five-O” that ends with a “To be continued next week.”
Kaman Corp. Composites Division has been awarded a contract to manufacture composite passenger entry and over-wing exit doors for the Bombardier Learjet 85 midsize business jet.
Bell Helicopter received 41 signed contracts at Heli-Expo 2011. The orders included 412EPs, 429s and 206L4s, as well as 11 new 407GXs from customers in North America, Asia, Latin America, Europe and the Middle East. At this year’s Heli-Expo, Bell announced the 407GX, a new version of the Bell 407 equipped with Garmin’s G1000H Integrated Flight Deck, and the 407AH, the first Bell-qualified armed commercial aircraft.
An attempt by the FAA to adopt a substantive change in the operations of FAR Part 135 certificate holders by means of a “rules interpretation” is under attack by a broad cross section of the air charter community.
I read “A Failed Culture of Safety” (Cause & Circumstance, February 2011, page 53) with great interest. Good article. I am sure you know the NTSB report on the Quest Diagnostics fatal crash was pulled from the Internet. Not good. I believe that our industry has a shared responsibility to operate safely for the benefit of all parties. Your observations regarding Quest Diagnostics are quite disappointing as it appears that Quest lacks a commitment to safe operations
Robinson Helicopter Company has a backlog of 169 new orders. The company delivered 162 aircraft in 2010: 40 R22s, 112 R44s, and 10 R66 turbine helicopters.
Sabreliner Corp. recently completed a Service Life Extension Program (SLEP) on a Learjet 35 air ambulance owned and operated by Fort Lauderdale, Fla.-based Aero Jet International. The SLEP was performed in Sabreliner’s Perryville, Mo., facility and involved an extensive inspection of all of the aircraft’s flight controls using state-of-the-art, non-destructive inspection techniques.
This short adventure began with an e-mail from a friend who flew with me at Piedmont Airlines. Vince was a 727 flight engineer but was now in Iraq with a company that has thousands of employees in Iraq. It uses Iraqi airliners with two Boeing 737-200s to shuttle its employees in country. The job was for a check airman to work on safety and compliance and to occasionally ride jump seat. A walk in the park, so to speak.
The European Commission approved the satellite-based European Geostationary Navigation Overlay Service (EGNOS) system for aviation operations. Like WAAS in the United States, EGNOS complements and improves the accuracy of GPS, allowing reduced-separation RNP operations and LPV approaches to any runway independent of ground installations. With the approval, EU member states can design and certify approaches.
FBO Million Air Houston announced in January a new general manager in the person of Robert Lee, most recently GM at Atlantic Aviation in Wheeling, Ill. He has more than 20 years of experience in aviation operations.
