Bombardier has relocated two of its strategic business jet units to London Farnborough Airport. Bombardier's business aircraft sales headquarters for Europe, as well as the headquarters of its charter arm, Skyjet International, are now located within TAG Aviation's new Farnborough facilities.
Confused about the rules? Don't know where to find the answer? The FAA has done a lot of work to make its Web site (www.faa.gov) easier to use. Type a few words into the search block and you will get a number of related documents such as Advisory Circulars, and other helpful information. One of the more useful tools is the Inspectors Handbook Series 8300-10. You can download this compendium of wisdom that your local FAA office uses as a guide.
(Kerrville, Texas) -- Heather Rider has been named the company's sales representative in the Northeast, with responsibility for selling airplanes in Connecticut, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Rhode Island and Vermont. A graduate of the University of North Dakota, she previously served as an account manager at Iviation, an aircraft services company based in Memphis.
"Unless we are talking about new or near-new long-range jets, this market is no longer the frenzied, red-hot bazaar that it was six months ago, stated Fletcher Aldredge in the second-quarter edition of his Market Leader newsletter. The publisher of the Vref Aircraft Value Reference, which tracks used aircraft prices, added, "Holding times are up and so is availability of some models."
EVERY SUMMER A SMALL group of aviation scribblers gather for a weekend away to consider the constitution of bracing libations, provide observations on the genders, and analyze the merits and histories of assorted aircraft. My children describe the sojourn as "Dad's weekend to drink whiskey, grow his beard and smoke cigars with his airplane buddies," which pretty much captures the spirit of the thing.
Fractional helicopter provider Heliflite added another Bell 430 twin-engine aircraft to its fleet. The company, headquartered in Fort Worth, Texas, now operates four Bell 430s and one Sikorsky S-76B. The new 430 will operate out of Newark Liberty (N.J.) International Airport.
The arrival of the Beech King Air 200 in 1974 sent shock waves throughout the turboprop industry, especially at Piper Aircraft where the Cheyenne II, a direct competitor for the Beech E90, had just made its debut. If Piper wanted to compete, it quickly would have to develop a much larger and more powerful model. Piper launched a clean-sheet turboprop development program that would become the PA-42 Cheyenne III in 1979.
The Experimental Aircraft Association warns that while auto fuel can be used in some aircraft, ethanol possesses chemical properties that harm aircraft engines and fueling systems. "It is critical for aircraft owners using auto fuel to know if the gasoline being used in their aircraft is pure," the association said. So the EAA recommends that all auto fuel be tested for ethanol before fueling an aircraft." It is selling a test kit for $15. For more information, visit www.eaa.org.
The pilot and copilot of a Citation Ultra arrived early at Friedman Memorial (SUN), the airport serving Sun Valley, Idaho, for what was to be a quick flight to the Carlsbad-McClellan-Palomar Airport (CRQ), 638 nm distant and some 30 miles north of San Diego. The two passengers that morning, Jan. 24, 2006, were a scientific instrument company executive on an out-and-back business trip and a family friend, who happened to be the wife of one of the aircraft's owners.
Arnold Scott has been an investigator with the NTBS since 1982, working out of its Colorado office. He likes the climate, he says: "They have four distinct seasons, with cold winters, and hot summers." When he moved his wife and the five kids out west, they settled first in Aurora. But when Judith --"she always wanted to live in the country"-- found a 27-acre ranch about 50 miles northeast of Denver, she called Scott to tell him about it. "I said ok, buy it," he recalls with a chuckle. That was in 1993, and they've been there ever since.
London Air Services, a charter operator based in Vancouver, British Columbia, signed a contract to buy a Bombardier Global Express XRS from the manufacturer. The aircraft will be used primarily to fly missions between North America and northern Asia. The XRS is scheduled for delivery in 2008. The charter provider, established in 1999, currently operates four Learjet 45 XR and two Challenger 604 business jets.
FAA Administrator Marion Blakey defended the Bush administration's decision to seek nearly $1 billion less for airport funding in fiscal 2007 than authorized by Congress, saying, "We must make the absolute best use of the taxpayers' dollars. Like other government agencies, the FAA had to take a hard look at our programs and make some difficult choices." Blakey was testifying before a Senate Commerce Committee field hearing in Anchorage, Alaska, chaired by Sen. Ted Stevens (R-Alaska), who had earlier expressed concerns about proposed FAA budget cuts.
A boon for pilots who use their back-up, handheld GPS for driving, Reichert Enterprises has expanded its line of GlareStomper flexible GPS sun visors to fit a broad range of Garmin, Magellan, Navman and Sony units, as well as every Tomtom model currently on the market. "When you plunk down hundreds of dollars for a GPS unit, you want to be able to see the map display in the daylight. That's exactly what we offer," says company founder Dave Reichert.
A dearth of open space suitable for urban development has combined with the need for cash-strapped municipal governments to seek short-term tax revenues, creating a "perfect storm" in the ongoing assault on general aviation airports.
The FAA published a final rule regarding drug or alcohol testing and medical certifications that includes several changes to airman medical certification standards and applies to all certificated airmen. It also impacts all organizations with FAA-mandated Drug and Alcohol Testing Programs. The rule changes the airman medical certification standards to disqualify an airman based on an alcohol test result of 0.04 or greater breath alcohol content.
A Gates Learjet 35A operated by International Jet Charter was destroyed when it impacted water and light stanchions while making an instrument approach through afternoon fog for landing at Groton-New London Airport (GON), in Connecticut. Both pilots were killed, but the three passengers survived with minor injuries. One of the passengers said he felt the aircraft "thrust up" just before it crashed, at which point "the jet tumbled across the water" before coming to rest upside down.
Online charter specialist CharterX Corp. is planning to launch a new Safety Intelligence service with the acquisition of New Jersey-based Wyvern Consulting, Ltd. Wyvern is known within the charter industry for its safety audits, consultancy and information services. Wyvern has performed more than 1,500 charter audits worldwide. CharterX, meanwhile, processes more than 2,000 aircraft requests each day and has a database of more than 15,000 aircraft worldwide.
Dassault elected to fit the Falcon 7X with one of the most redundant fly-by-wire (FBW) systems ever installed in a civil jet. It's highly fault-tolerant so its master minimum equipment list will be long and complete. Dispatch will be permitted with multiple single components faults, including failure of one channel of each side-stick controller, one SmartProbe inoperative and loss of a single flight data concentrator, one channel in a main flight control computer (MFCC) or in an actuator control monitoring unit.
Raisbeck Engineering, Inc., Seattle. Sam L. Jantzen Jr. was promoted to vice president and general manager; Bobby Patton was promoted to marketing manager of King Air Performance Systems; Edwin Black was named marketing manager of Learjet Performance Systems; Leslie Dycus was named advertising and public relations manager.
Nav Canada was informed July 14 that the new daily charge for small aircraft at seven major international airports complies with the charging principles of the Civil Air Navigation Services Commercialization Act. The charge had been appealed to the Canadian Transportation Agency (CTA) by the Canadian Owners and Pilots Association and the Helicopter Association of Canada.
With your Gulfstream vectored to the localizer and cleared for the approach at FL 330, you drop the main gear, call for positive flaps, deploy the Spey's thrust reversers, and push the nose over to a 22-degree negative angle of attack. Egads! With the flaps extended above the wing-like spoilers, airspeed pegs at 250 knots, and you set up a 10,000-fpm rate of descent. As the altimeter unwinds dizzyingly, you allow approach speed to build to 300 knots, then with the runway threshold looming in the windshield, call for down-flaps to begin breaking the descent.
The National Air Transportation Association objected when the FAA released a notice calling for all jet aircraft crews to recalculate landing distance in flight, using current data, to ensure at least a 15-percent margin between the calculated landing distance and the actual available runway -- but bypassed the required rulemaking notice and comment procedures. The FAA said it was just a clarification of policy and that the agency would issue a new Operations Specification/Management Specification mandating the new requirements, possibly as soon as Sept. 1.
Embraer has consolidated its offices in Europe into a new building in Villepinte, France, close to the Roissy Charles de Gaulle Airport, north of Paris. The new facilities will serve Embraer operators located in Europe, the Middle East and Africa. Embraer's new European headquarters occupies 67,866 square feet, including a state-of-the-art 37,458-square-foot warehouse.
