North America has traditionally accounted for about 75 percent of all business jets sold, but overseas sales are starting to account for a bigger share of new orders. Dassault Falcon Jet expects international orders to exceed U.S. orders this year for the first time in many years, according to President John Rosanvallon. Cessna and Raytheon Aircraft also report strong demand from overseas customers.
CIRRUS LOOKING AT SINGLE-ENGINE JET UNDER $1 MILLION - Cirrus Design Corp., which has enjoyed remarkable success building a line of single-engine piston-powered personal aircraft, is looking at a potential new product - a personal airplane powered by a single jet engine.
CAE is moving a Sikorsky S-76 and Gulfstream IV simulator from its CAE SimuFlite Dallas, Texas facility to the company's new training center in Morristown, N.J. The new center also will house simulators for the Falcon 7X, Falcon 900 EX/EASy and 2000 EX/EASy. CAE broke ground on the center earlier this fall and will begin moving simulators into the facility by summer 2006. The facility initially will incorporate six simulator bays but will be designed to accommodate future expansion.
December 1-2 - National Air Transportation Association Line Service Supervisor Training, Albuquerque, N.M., (703) 845-9000 January 8-12, 2006 - American Association of Airport Executives Aviation Issues Conference, Hapuna Beach Prince Hotel, Kona, Hawaii, (703) 824-0504, www.airportnet.org January 25-27, 2006 - National Business Aviation Association Schedulers & Dispatchers Conference, San Antonio, Texas, (202) 783-9000
Jet-Care International won a contract from the U.S. Coast Guard to provide oil and debris analysis for Turbomeca Arriel 2C2CG engines that power the service's re-engined HH-65C Dolphin helicopters. Jet-Care will provide analysis for more than 200 engines.
National Business Aviation Association elected three new directors last week during the association's annual meeting and convention: Ronald Duncan, president, CEO and co-founder of Alaska-based General Communication, Inc.; Michael Herman, chairman, North American Communications; and Monte J.M. Koch, chairman, mergers and acquisitions-Americas, Deutsche Bank. "These three new directors are a good fit in our effort to make the board more diverse in its perspective than it has ever been," said NBAA Board Chairman Ken Emerick.
CESSNA WINS MULTI-JET ORDER FROM AUSTRIAN OPERATOR - Cessna Aircraft won an order for 20 business jets valued at more than $200 million from Jetalliance of Vienna, Austria. The order comprises two Citation X, seven Sovereign, four XLS, five CJ2+ and two CJ3 aircraft, all of which are to be part of Jetalliance's expansion into eastern Europe. Deliveries are scheduled to begin next year.
JEFF RIANS was promoted to maintenance sales representative for Mayo Aviation. Rians has experience in aircraft parts and modification sales. In his new role, he will be responsible for expanding Mayo's King Air and Learjet maintenance business.
ATR last week received a contract from Karachi, Pakistan-based carrier PIA for seven new ATR 42-500 aircraft. The contract, valued at US$100 million, calls for the aircraft to be delivered beginning in May 2006 and continuing into 2007. The aircraft will replace PIA's aging F-27 fleet. The order is the latest in a series of sales that the Franco-Italian consortium has secured this year. Since January, ATR has sold 70 new aircraft and boosted the overall ATR orderbook to 758 (398 ATR 42s and 360 ATR 72s).
Corporate Angel Network (CAN) arranged 253 patient flights last month, a record for the charity that works with corporate and fractional operators to provide free air transportation for cancer patients traveling for treatment. CAN's previous one-month record of 244 patient flights was set last year. CAN also passed another milestone in October, arranging the 22,000th cancer patient flight. The passenger aboard the flight, Kathy Minor, was a bone marrow transplant patient at the Mayo Clinic.
NAVY GETS FIRST PRESIDENTIAL FLEET TEST HELICOPTER - The U.S. Navy received its first VH-71A presidential helicopter Nov. 2 in ceremonies at the Naval Air Station Patuxent River. The aircraft, also known as Test Vehicle No. 1 (TV-1), was flown in from Oswego, N.Y. where preliminary training was conducted for pilots and maintenance personnel. Oswego will be the manufacturing site for the program. TV-1 is essentially an Agusta Westland EH101 multi-mission helicopter. The No.
S-TEC donated a 55X autopilot for a solo around-the-world flight planned by 21-year-old pilot Barrington Irving. Irving is hoping to become the first African-American and the youngest pilot, to fly solo around the world, S-TEC said, adding that the flight is intended "to inspire minorities and youth in general to pursue achievements in aerospace and aviation." Flying a Columbia 400, Irving will depart May 4, 2006 from Miami Opa-Locka Airport and take an East-to-West path that will return to Opa-Locka June 2.
SOUTHERN BORDER PATROL FLIGHTS UNDER WAY WITH PREDATOR B UAV - The Department of Homeland Security has begun flying missions with the Predator B unmanned aerial vehicle over Arizona's border with Mexico and so far credits the aircraft with 87 arrests of illegal border crossers. The flights began Oct. 4 and are taking place out of Ft. Huachuca, Ariz., according to Rowdy Adams, senior associate chief at the Office of Border Patrol.
Bombardier Aerospace broke ground on a new factory-owned service center at the company's Love Field complex in Dallas, Texas. The nearly 100,000-square-foot facility will boost service space by 60 percent and accommodate all models of Learjet, Challenger and Global business jets. The new complex - a 52,500-square-foot hangar and 45,000 square feet of back shops and office space - is expected to be operational in the third quarter of next year. It will house about 125 employees, a figure that could increase to nearly 200 over the next five years.
Landmark Aviation Executives signaled their intent last month to be aggressive in acquiring fixed-base operations at busy business aviation airports (BA, Oct. 31/199), and the first deal could be announced this week. Sources say Landmark has agreed to buy the Skyport operation at Westchester County Airport (HPN) in White Plains, N.Y.
ATCA BOARD TO REPLACE BOLLINGER AS PRESIDENT - Just two years after selecting Paul (Bo) Bollinger as president of the Air Traffic Control Association (ATCA), the ATCA board last week unexpectedly decided it wanted to find a new president. The board's decision to replace Bollinger, a 25-year industry veteran, came during ATCA's annual meeting in Dallas, Texas, as the association was scheduled to begin a year-long celebration of its 50th anniversary.
FAA selected a Department of Agriculture official and a University of Buffalo distinguished professor as the 2005 recipients of the agency's Excellence in Aviation Research Awards. Richard Dolbeer, coordinator of the Aviation Safety and Assistance Program for the Agriculture Department, is being recognized for his work in wildlife hazard mitigation. Dolbeer created the U.S. Department of Agriculture/Wildlife Service Aviation Research Project, an effort to reduce wildlife hazards to aviation, and helped create the National Wildlife Strike Database.
Theodore E. (Ted) Dumont, who spent decades working for Sikorsky Aircraft and serving in a number of key committee assignments with the Helicopter Association of America (now Helicopter Association International) died unexpectedly Nov. 2 in Milford, Conn. where he resided. Dumont, born in 1919 in Bellevue, Ky., graduated from the aeronautical engineering program at the University of Cincinnati in 1942. After serving in the U.S. Army Air Force, he worked in New York for the Civil Aeronautics Administration, the predecessor of FAA.
