Eclipse Aviation secured an additional $87 million funding package, which is intended to carry the company through the development and certification of the Eclipse 500 with its new Pratt & Whitney Canada PW610F turbofans, the company announced.
The first production Cessna CJ3 flew three weeks ahead of the original schedule on Aug. 8, according to Cessna. The CJ3 took off from McConnell AFB in Wichita and landed at Mid-Continent Airport 1.5 hours later. Serial number 001 flew Cessna's standard first flight profile including speeds from stall to MMO and coupled approaches. This aircraft will be the primary platform for avionics development and certification according to the company.
Gary/Chicago Airport (GYY) and city of Gary, Ind., officials are tickled pink with Boeing's decision to base its corporate fleet there and lease the well appointed 50,000-square-foot hangar that Gary constructed to attract just such an operation. Boeing said it expects to assign 35 maintenance and operations personnel to the facility, which features offices, parts storage, a maintenance shop, briefing area, conference rooms, a fitness center, transient crew rest rooms and a technical library.
The FAA grounded all Learjet 45s on Aug. 13, with an Airworthiness Directive for the replacement of the horizontal stabilizer actuator assembly (HSSA). The AD grounds all 173 U.S.-registered Model 45s, except those on positioning flights to a facility where the work required by the AD can be performed. In April, the FAA issued AD 2003-06-51 also directing replacement of HSSAs having defective acme screws and nuts that had unacceptable susceptibility to brittle fracture. Their failure could result in the loss of the aircraft.
LET'S SEE, HERSCH, it was the last year we operated the Lockheed ``Lodestone,'' as Hardy John Harder used to call it, so it was 1954 or approximately 20 years and 8,000 hours ago. At our cruising altitude, seven thou, it was one of those clear nights that pulls astronomers out of the woodwork. The month was December, close to Christmas, and we were on our usual ELM-TEB-ELM milk run. Zitzing up V-35, tower clears us for an approach, which is a pretty legit way to descend through the semi-broken clouds, whose tops were at 6,500 feet and bases about 5,000 feet.
As further evidence that general aviation is alive and well, the AOPA announced that its membership topped 400,000 members on July 29, a new record for the world's largest civil aviation organization. The AOPA is now among the top 100 associations of any kind in the United States, the group said. More than 61 percent of all U.S. pilots -- and three-quarters of general aviation pilots -- are AOPA members.
Bombardier delivered the first of four ordered 74-seat Q400 turboprops to ANA subsidiary Air Nippon Network. They will be based at Itami Airport in Osaka and operate between Osaka and Kochi, Japan.
Cessna has announced a program for its propeller airplane owners to refurbish their instrument panes with new lighting and markings at a Cessna Service Center. Cessna estimates an owner can save as much as 75 percent over the cost of replacing a time-worn panel.
The head of Hawker Pacific's Middle East operations, Paul Giles, said the Bell/Agusta AB139 was attracting considerable interest because it answered many of the problems that tended to challenge operators in the offshore oil and gas industry. Giles said Hawker Pacific already had a solid order book for the AB139. He said that with deliveries scheduled to begin in 2004, further orders should start to firm once certification is completed this year.
Corporate Rotable & Supply, Inc. is giving away a customized Harley Davidson 1200 motorcycle at this year's NBAA Convention in Orlando. The on-site giveaway will take place on the second show day, Oct. 8, at booth #5251.
Dawning awareness of the enormous potential impact of the FAA's FAR Part 135/125 review on the entire industry generated a new wave of requests from people who want a seat on one of the advisory committees or subcommittees, even as the second round of meetings got under way. Because the review group already includes more than 140 members, and given the limited amount of time to catch up on material already discussed, FAA officials told the Weekly of Business Aviation, it does not plan to honor new requests for membership after the August meeting.
The second Embraer 175 (s.n. 0017) made its maiden flight on Aug. 7, just seven weeks after the first flight of the prototype (s.n. 0014). The flight took place from Embraer's headquarters and aircraft manufacturing facility at So Jose dos Campos. Certification by Brazil's CTA, the U.S. FAA and Europe's JAA is expected in third quarter 2004. M.V.
The world got its first look at the Citation Mustang mockup with a Garmin G1000 cockpit and Pratt & Whitney Canada PW615F turbofan engine at the Experimental Aircraft Association AirVenture. (See ``Flying Garmin's G1000,'' page 90.)
Embraer has delivered the first cabin crew trainer (CCT) for the Embraer 170/190 family to Swiss Aviation Training (SAT) in Basel. SAT will offer crew training to all European operators of the new regional jet. The CCT is equipped with a touch-screen command console, which can simulate normal and emergency situations, including partial and total smoke in the cabin, cabin depressurization and door blocking, as well as lavatory and external fires. Four strategically placed cameras will be used for briefing and assessment of cabin crew performance.
After a yearlong re-restoration project, Boeing's 307 Stratoliner, the only remaining example of the world's first pressurized airliner, arrived once again at EAA AirVenture. The 307 made its first public debut at EAA AirVenture 2001 after an extensive six-year restoration project. In March 2002, just before it was to be delivered to the National Air and Space Museum in Washington, D.C., the airplane ditched in Elliott Bay, just west of downtown Seattle, when it ran out of fuel after an out and back.
States situated adjacent to other states that don't assess sales tax (read: tax havens) have traditionally enacted laws intended to ``recover'' taxes on property purchased outside the taxing state for ultimate use within its borders. The state of California assesses sales tax and shares a northern border with Oregon, a state that eschews sales tax. California's use tax applies only to property ``purchased for use'' within the state. The old so-called ``90-day rule,'' Section 6248 of the California revenue code, applied to such property, e.g., ``. . .
MY BOSS DOESN'T REALLY understand aviation. This is nothing new. I have never worked for an executive who truly understood what we all do for a living, nor have any ever appreciated the complexity involved in properly managing an aviation operation. However, our employers certainly do appreciate the advantages of owning a business jet and, with few exceptions, trust that we are providing the safest and most efficient air transportation possible. In short, they assume we know how to manage.
In 1990, Socata started deliveries of the world's first pressurized single-engine turboprop, an aircraft designed to slash the cost of high-speed, all-weather business aircraft travel. The six-seat airplane not only cost about half the price of a typical twin turboprop, it also was faster, burned at least one-third less fuel and had one less engine to overhaul. The aircraft actually could fly typical 300-mile missions within 10 minutes of many light twin jets. But the high-performance pioneer had weight challenges.
Honeywell and West Star Aviation at Walker Field in Grand Junction, Colo., announced that they have FAA TSO and STC approval for their Learjet 35/36 RVSM compliance package. Russ Williams, vice president of sales and marketing for West Star Aviation, said, ``This is a fully integrated package for our Learjet 35 and 36 customers. Customers can also have their required two-year re-certification tests performed at approved facilities located throughout the country.
A BAe 146-300 airliner has been highly modified as an atmospheric research aircraft. Its interior and exterior conversion was completed by BAE Systems Regional Aircraft facility at Woodford, England, for Britain's Facility for Airborne Atmospheric Measurement (FAAM). The aircraft has external radiometer blisters on the front and rear; two LIDAR laser apertures in the upper and lower rear fuselage; two wing pylons each supporting up to four scientific equipment canisters; air sampling and sensing equipment and various avionics upgrades.
The source of the Fairchild Dornier 328 turboprops acquired by Great Plains Airlines was misstated in an Intelligence item in our August issue (page 18). The aircraft were acquired from Air Finance, not Air France.
Safe Flight Instrument Corp.'s long and extensive support of the Corporate Angel Network (CAN) earned it national recognition recently in the W.D. Littleford Awards for Corporate Community Service competition. The White Plains, N.Y., instrument maker was active in CAN's creation and has been a generous benefactor ever since, offering cancer patients transport in its corporate aircraft, as well as donating maintenance, storage space, expertise and money to the organization.
OMF Aircraft is working with BRS Technologies to certify its parachute recovery system on the Symphony 160 single-engine two-place aircraft. OMF also announced that it is extending its $2,000 flight training scholarship promotion for Symphony buyers. With the Symphony 160 certificated in the United States, Canada and Germany, and the European-targeted jet-fuel-burning diesel engine Symphony 135-TDI in flight test, plus the new four-place Symphony 4 scheduled to fly later this year, the company wants to keep up interest in the marketplace.
A recent report published by the Flight Safety Foundation reveals that 58 percent of commercial helicopter accidents occur in IMC. Pilots of fixed-wing aircraft have their troubles, too. Within the ranks of general aviation, weather has always been a significant factor in accident statistics, with dire consequences: As noted in the latest Nall safety report, 58.5 percent of the accidents occurring in IMC resulted in fatalities. So, regardless of what or where we fly, our ability to avoid bad weather is a key safety factor.
A new AOPA Air Safety Foundation study of stall/spin-type accidents contradicts some commonly held beliefs. ``A common misconception is that student pilots are most likely to suffer fatal stall/spin type accidents,'' said ASF Executive Director Bruce Landsberg. ``ASF's research shows that's completely untrue. Pilots with commercial pilot certificates are far more likely to be involved in such accidents,'' he continued, stating that stall and spin-related accidents, with a fatality rate of about 28 percent, account for about 10 percent of all general aviation accidents.
