Boeing Business Jets President Borge Boeskov said the company now has orders for 25 of its 737-derivative BBJ executive aircraft, including firm orders for two from PrivatAir, a charter operator based in Geneva, Switzerland. First of the BBJs for PrivatAir will be delivered in June 1999, with the second following in November 1999. PrivatAir also has options for two BBJs.
TWO BRITISH PILOTS set an around-the-world speed record in a 16-year-old MD 500D helicopter. Stephen Good and Michael Smith of HeliAir Helicopters, Wellsbourne, Warwick, England, completed the flight in 13-1/2 days and about 200 flight hours.
AIRBUS, which said in May it was marketing a corporate version of its A319 airliner, told an NBAA press conference it had received commitments for seven of the aircraft in the first three months of the marketing campaign.
FEDERAL AVIATION ADMINISTRATION last week confirmed that it has filled four of the five top vacancies in its Flight Standards Service with veteran employees (BA, Sept. 15/108). The agency selected Richard Gordon as deputy director of flight standards, Quentin Smith as manager of the Air Transportation Division, Ava Mims as Aircraft Maintenance Division manager and Robert Wright as Technical Programs Division manager. The appointments generally have received high praise from industry observers who have worked with the appointees.
National Civil Aviation Review Commission, in its preliminary report submitted to Transportation Secretary Rodney Slater this month, repeated many of the themes raised by past commissions but said that while the problems facing the aviation community are "not new, there is now a realization and a consensus as to their seriousness and implications." It warned that "traffic data and trends indicate that adding just a few minutes of delay to each airline flight in the United States will bring the aviation system to gridlock with dramatic negative impacts on the economy."
Federal Aviation Administration last week successfully began demonstrations of its Wide Area Augmentation System (WAAS) at the Tijuana Airport, Mexico, using a Nav Canada Challenger to fly Category 1 flight paths guided by signals from the National Satellite Test Bed. Four demonstration flights with the Challenger business jet performed approaches as low as 50 feet, and Mexican officials consider the technology "very promising," said J.C. Johns, FAA's director of satellite navigation.
In what Chairman and Chief Executive David Burner called an "offensive move" to increase its aerospace business, BFGoodrich reached agreement on a merger with Rohr Inc. after two weeks of negotiations. Rohr shareholders will receive 0.7 shares of BFGoodrich stock for each share of Rohr. The $1.3 billion price tag is split between $882 million in stock and the assumption of $418 million in Rohr debt. The companies expect the deal to close 90 to 120 days after regulatory and shareholder approval.
THE LURE of the fractional ownership business is continuing to draw new OEM participants, including Dassault Falcon Jet (DFJ). John Rosanvallon, president of the Teterboro, N.J.-based company that markets and supports the French-built line of Falcon business jets, said at last week's NBAA convention in Dallas that he expects to announce a fractional ownership program within the next few weeks. Rosanvallon said DFJ plans to work with people already in the fractional ownership business rather than starting its own program from scratch.
The Transportation Department has agreed to tell the U.S. Court of Appeals that FAA's Dec. 31 regulations sharply restricting commercial air tour overflights of the Grand Canyon did not comply with the federal Regulatory Flexibility Act (RFA), in return for the U.S. Small Business Administration's agreeing not to file a friend-of-the-court brief with the court that would have raised the RFA issue.
MERCURY AIR GROUP, INC., suspended the company's regular dividend payment and plans to spend up to $3 million to continue repurchasing the company's stock on the open market. "The board of directors felt that Mercury would be able to better enhance shareholder value in directing resources toward the repurchase of stock," said Chairman Seymour Kahn in explaining the decision to suspend the quarterly dividends of $0.0125 per share.
AMY FISCHER was promoted to the newly created position of sales/marketing coordinator for Wayfarer Aviation. Fischer joined the company's Flight Service Department nearly a year ago. Before that, she was a charter sales representative for KC Aviation in Montvale, N.H. and vice president and co- owner of American Wings, an aircraft sales and brokerage company in Montgomery, N.Y.
GALAXY AEROSPACE last week broke ground for its worldwide headquarters at Fort Worth Alliance Airport. The ground-breaking follows the rollout earlier in the month of the Galaxy business jet (BA, Sept. 8/101).
SIGNATURE FLIGHT SUPPORT promoted Kevin Worley to vice president-airline sales. Worley has served with Signature for five years, most recently as director-airline sales.
FEDERAL AVIATION ADMINISTRATION reported that the civil aviation authorities of India, Bermuda and Jamaica comply with international safety standards and have been rated Category 1. The decision resolved a sometimes heated exchange between the U.S. and Jamaica over the latter's lower status. In July 1995, FAA rated Jamaica "conditional" following a November 1994 assessment. Jamaica's Category 2 rating meant that it did not meet International Civil Aviation Organization safety standards in some areas.
RAPIDLY GROWING fractional aircraft ownership programs are helping drive the demand for new business jets, and a new industry study predicts the fractional share providers will maintain their meteoric pace over the next several years. AlliedSignal forecasters say fractional ownership will continue to grow at 50 percent per year for at least the next three or four years, before the rate begins to decline slightly as the base increases in size. The annual forecast by the engine manufacturer says there are 130,000 businesses in the U.S.
SPECTRUM TECHNOLOGIES received additional orders from Bombardier Aerospace for two Capris 100 ultraviolet laser wire marking and processing systems. The systems will replace existing laser wire marking systems at Bombardier's de Havilland facility in Downsview, Ontario, and will be used for the de Havilland Dash 8 Series 400 and other Bombardier aircraft, including the Global Express. The order brings the total number of Capris 100 systems sold to Bombardier to five, including one system in the Short Brothers facility in Belfast, Northern Ireland.
RAYTHEON's Travel Air fractional ownership effort has exceeded early expectations seven weeks after beginning to sell shares in its program aircraft, officials said last week. Raytheon Travel Air President Gary Hart characterized the program as strong and expects the market to remain robust for at least the next five years. "We have sold multiple shares in each of the aircraft," Hart said. Raytheon launched the program with three King Air B200s, four Beechjet 400As and a Hawker 800XP and plans to add a Beechjet and a couple of Hawkers by yearend.
Model 328-100 (Docket No. 95-NM-182-AD) - proposes to require replacement of the anti-skid control unit of the aircraft braking system with an improved unit. This proposal is prompted by issuance of mandatory continuing airworthiness information by a foreign civil airworthiness authority. The actions specified by the proposed AD are intended to prevent disconnect of the anti-skid control unit and reversion to manual braking during operation on runways contaminated by standing water, slush or wet snow.
Model DHC-7 series airplanes (Docket No. 97-NM-36-AD; Amdt. 39-10141; AD 97-20-03) - requires revising the airplane flight manual to prohibit positioning the power levers below the flight idle stop during flight, and to add a statement of the consequences of such positioning of the power levers. This amendment is prompted by incidents and accidents involving airplanes equipped with turboprop engines in which the propeller ground beta range was used improperly during flight.
Representatives of the Coalition of Airline Pilot Associations took their safety concerns to Capitol Hill this month, lobbying for action on a number of issues, including further flight and duty time restrictions. CAPA is concerned about FAA's failure to act on flight time and duty time and test regulations since June 1996, when the public comment period closed on the notice of proposed rulemaking the agency issued in 1995. Pilots complain that they have been working under rules mostly unchanged since the 1930s, many of which are antiquated and poorly written.
BOEING BUSINESS JETS is working with six completion centers that will have access to the manufacturer's electronic aircraft data on the 737 derivative. In addition to K-C Aviation, Dallas, Texas and Jet Aviation in Basel, Switzerland, announced earlier, the selected completion centers are Associated Air Center, Dallas; Raytheon E-Systems, Waco, Texas; The Jet Center, Van Nuys, Calif.; and Lufthansa Technik, Hamburg, Germany
Most of general aviation should experience little change in the aviation excise taxes, which are renewed for 10 years beginning Wednesday, but charter and a few other operators will see fairly substantial changes in the taxes they and their clients pay. As reported earlier, the aviation fuel taxes will continue at the present rate of 15 cents per gallon for aviation gasoline and 17.5 cents per gallon for jet fuel.
DRS Technologies Inc., Parsippany, N.J., will acquire the assets of the Applied Systems Division of Spar Aerospace Ltd. for about $29 million in cash, DRS announced last week. It said the deal should boost its prospects in defense electronics and commercial aerospace. Applied Systems, headquartered in Kanata, Ontario, was created in 1990 through the merger of Spar Defense Systems Division and the acquired assets of Leigh Instruments Ltd., and makes and markets flight safety systems, naval communication systems and other advanced electronics.
Model 214ST helicopters (Docket No. 96-SW-27-AD; Amdt. 39-10108; AD 97-17-06) - requires replacement of each emergency float inflation solenoid valve. This amendment is prompted by two inadvertent inflations of emergency float systems that resulted from self-activation of the valves. The actions specified by this AD are intended to prevent self- activation of the valves, and subsequent inadvertent inflation of the emergency float system, which could lead to loss of control of the helicopter.
