The Senate Thursday adopted an amendment to the comprehensive FAA reauthorization bill providing up to $100 million in funding for certain general aviation entities that can demonstrate losses stemming from the aftermath of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks (BA, June 2/249). Both Sens. James Inhofe (R-Okla.) and Conrad Burns (R-Mont.) drafted GA relief measures, but they agreed to offer the Burns amendment, which is similar to a provision in the House reauthorization bill.
John W. (Jack) Olcott is stepping down as president of the National Business Aviation Association at the end of the month to devote his attention to running General Aero Co., a business based at the Morristown, N.J. Airport in which he has had a proprietary interest for some time. Olcott, who now owns the company outright, said he would be engaged in process management for companies interested in improving safety, security and management of their flight departments.
Bombardier Flexjet developed a new Versatility Plus program that allows its fractional jet owners to exchange hours among themselves. Using Versatility Plus, shareholders may trade in or draw up to 25 percent of their annual allocated hours from a pool. Customers who trade in shares receive credit for them. Customers lose the hours they don't use in most fractional programs, Bombardier said. "We have worked with many Flexjet owners over the past few months to design this significant program enhancement," said Flexjet President Michael McQuay.
ASP Ventures Corp., Vancouver, British Columbia, will acquire 100 percent of three fractional ownership businesses that offer shares in aircraft, exclusive real estate properties and yachts. The share exchange agreement was struck with Elite Jet, Inc., Elite Property, Inc., and Elite Yachts, Inc. Elite Jets was formed in 2001 and offers fractional shares in seven Falcon 20F business jets.
NBAA DECRIES SANTA MONICA WEIGHT-BASED FEE SCHEME - The Santa Monica City Council last week adopted a new landing fee schedule for Santa Monica Airport (SMO) under which prices go up dramatically as aircraft weight increases. Tuesday's approval of the new fee schedule came over the objections of the National Business Aviation Association and continues the disagreements between the city and the aviation community over the safety of allowing larger business jets to use the airport.
DOT FINALLY FILLS FAA'S COO POST - The Department of Transportation last week named an American Airlines executive, Russell Chew, to serve as the Federal Aviation Administration's chief operating officer, filling a post that remained vacant for three years and that some feared would be abandoned altogether. Congress created the COO post in spring 2000 when it enacted the comprehensive aviation reauthorization legislation, AIR-21.
ARINC of Annapolis, Md. will create a new business unit devoted to aeronautical satellite voice, narrowband and broadband data services for commercial, military and business aviation markets. ARINC Satellite Services will be headed by Robert B. Thompson, senior director of the company's SKYLink aeronautical broadband services unit. The new unit will combine ARINC's GLOBALink/Satellite operations with its SKYLink Ku-band satellite business.
Raytheon's Standard Terminal Automation Replacement System (STARS) was commissioned at Philadelphia International Airport, the first major airport to deploy the system. The STARS system achieved initial operational capability at Philadelphia in November and has been under evaluation since that time. The air traffic automation system includes new high-resolution color displays, new computer processing and computer equipment, six-level display of weather, multi-radar tracking and the ability to incorporate new hardware and software features.
Jet Aviation in Bedford, Mass. will install its first reduced vertical separation minimum system on a Beechjet 400A this month. Tom Mitchell, senior vice president and general manager of the Bedford facility, said that he expects to see more requests for RVSM modification in the next year as FAA's December 2004 deadline for compliance approaches.
Aircraft Owners And Pilots Association's 13th annual Fly-In and Open House drew more than 3,000 people despite weather "that remained stubbornly IFR." About 165 aircraft flew in for the event, and 2,700 people drove in for the day. Thirty-three aircraft were on display ranging from two-seat trainers such as the OMF-160 Symphony to larger aircraft, including the Beech King Air, Pilatus PC-12 and Cessna Grand Caravan.
GENERAL DYNAMICS will add to its non-aviation holdings with an agreement announced last week to acquire Veridian Corp. for $1.23 billion. Veridian, which is based in Arlington, Va., provides a range of information technology products to the federal government in addition to supplying surveillance and security systems for agencies. GD also is the parent company of Gulfstream Aerospace.
Global Jet Shares, a start-up fractional ownership venture that plans to sell shares in Gulfstream jets, hired Thinkbig, based in Orange County, Calif., as its advertising agency of record. Thinkbig said Global Jet Shares is planning a major launch this fall during the National Business Aviation Association annual meeting and convention in Orlando, Fla.
FAA Administrator Marion Blakey is scheduled to be in Europe this week to meet with the management board of the European Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) to discuss FAA's issues and any concerns about the transition from individual European national aviation safety agencies to the new entity that will oversee aviation safety issues for all of Europe. While in Brussels, Blakey also is scheduled to participate in the European Civil Aviation Conference and meet with Loyola de Palacio, transport commissioner of the European Commission.
WSI Corporation received FAA supplemental type certification for the installation of its InFlight AV200 cockpit weather briefing system aboard a Piper Saratoga. In addition, WSI and its manufacturing partner, SANDIA Aerospace, submitted an application for parts manufacturing authority for WSI InFlight, which the company said will be the final step in certifying the system. WSI InFlight continuously broadcasts near-real-time WSI weather information directly to the cockpit using geo-synchronous satellite service.
Garmin Ltd. retired its long-term debt with the purchase of all $20 million of outstanding industrial revenue bonds issued in 2000. "The bond purchase is intended to redeploy a portion of our cash and cash equivalents to increase overall profitability," said Garmin CFO and Treasurer Kevin Rauckman.
OWNER-FLOWN FRACTIONAL COMPANY TAKES OFF - Canadian fractional aircraft company OurPLANE is expanding its business by adding two new aircraft to its fleet this month and opening a new base in Houston, Texas. A Cessna 182T will be based at Toronto, Ontario Brampton Airport and a Cirrus SR22 will be based at John Wayne Airport in Orange County, Calif. The new Houston base will open in September and offer shares in Cirrus aircraft.
L-3 TO ACQUIRE BOMBARDIER'S MILITARY AVIATION UNIT - L-3 Communications plans to buy Bombardier's Military Aviation Services business for nearly $90 million.
EMBRAER ORDER BOOK CONTINUES TO SWELL WITH JETBLUE DEAL - Brazilian plane-maker Embraer continued to increase its backlog with last week's announcement of another major order, a 100-aircraft deal with JetBlue valued at about $3 billion (U.S.). Low-fare carrier JetBlue Airways placed firm orders for 100 Embraer 190 aircraft and took options for up to 100 more. Delivery of the aircraft is slated to begin in the third quarter of 2005 and continue through 2011 at a rate of about 18 per year. Options deliveries would begin in 2011.
National Air Transportation Association's joint regional meetings with the Aircraft Electronics Association on the Part 145 rewrite continue to have a strong showing, with some 170 maintenance and other interested executives attending the recent session in Kansas City, Mo., and about 750 industry representatives attending the program throughout the country. The NATA/AEA-sponsored events provide FAA a forum for explaining the new rules governing Part 145 repair stations and accompanying guidance material.
BOMBARDIER Model DHC-8-102, -103, and -106 airplanes; Model DHC-8-201 and -202 airplanes; and Model DHC-8-301, -311, and -315 Airplanes (Docket No. 2001-NM-109-AD) - revises an earlier proposed AD that would have required replacement of the elevator stop bumpers of the horizontal stabilizer with new bumpers. Among other actions, this new AD revises the proposed rule by incorporating revised replacement intervals for the elevator stop bumpers into the applicable airworthiness limitation.
LARRY ADAMS was appointed vice president and general manager of the flight services division of Keystone Helicopter, West Chester, Pa. He was most recently director of flight operations for Rocky Mountain Holdings and also previously worked as operations manager for Petroleum Helicopters. Adams fills the position vacated by Rick Hinkle, who will be Keystone's vice president of program development.
SGI is teaming with The Boeing Company to offer Six Sigma, real-time optimization and other manufacturing improvement products. Boeing will license SGI to distribute Boeing-developed problem solving software. In addition, Boeing Phantom Works' Mathematics and Computing Technology organization will provide consulting services in Design For Six Sigma integrated with multidisciplinary design optimization and real-time optimization process applications.
