JOHN DAUT was appointed U.S. regional sales director for the Northeast for Nextant Aerospace. Daut has more than 30 years of sales experience, formerly serving as vice president of sales for Marquis Jet. After Marquis was acquired by NetJets, he became senior vice president of sales, leading the Northeast sales efforts and also overseeing the company’s expansion into Asia.
Rockwell Collins added capabilities to its Ascend Flight Operations System (FOS) schedule and dispatch system for business aircraft operations. The new capabilities including integrated flight tracking, an enhanced trip request module and a filtering option for airport databases. Rockwell Collins integrated FOS with its Ascend Flight Manager to provide the flight tracking options, which enables subscribers to view their aircraft’s position in flight, as well as the flight path of completed and upcoming flights. The system enables overlay of satellite and U.S. radar data.
Beechcraft’s factory-owned Hawker Beechcraft Services facilities were authorized to install the CenTex Halo 250 gross weigh increase modification for Beechcraft King Air 200 aircraft. The Halo 250 conversion adds 920 lb. of payload capacity through an increase in maximum takeoff weight from 12,500 lb. to 13,420 lb. Waco, Texas-based CenTex Aerospace developed the modification, which received FAA certification in October. The increase can be installed via a normal category supplemental type certificate (STC) or a commuter category STC.
BARRY COSTA was named director of Mitre Corporation’s Technology Transfer Office. Costa joined Mitre in 1984 and has more than 30 years of experience working with a variety of technologies and data collection projects.
Business aircraft financing has become more available but lending has changed, with financial institutions becoming more segmented and specialized, an industry expert says.
The National Business Aviation Association’s next Business Aviation Regional Forum is set for June 6 at Westchester County Airport’s Panorama Flight Service, White Plains, N.Y. The Westchester Aviation Association is an active supporter of the event. When last held there in 2011, the forum drew 1,900 attendees, and a similar figure is expected this year as well. Some 120 exhibitors and nearly 30 aircraft will be on display.
KINGSLEY OKOLI was appointed regional sales director for Beechcraft products in Sub-Saharan Africa. Okoli will be based in Nigeria. He spent 13 years with the U.S. Air Force, working in the West Africa region and with the Nigerian air force. He was an F-16 crew chief and later a fighter squadron logistics readiness office. Most recently, he was senior program analyst for IMSolutions.
Honeywell is teaming with Swiss-based Jetex to expand its global flight support services reach. The partnership, the companies say, will expand their flight planning aircraft data link, flight following and international trip support services. Jetex will resell Honeywell’s Global Data Center flight support services to customers in Europe, the Middle East and Asia-Pacific. These include Honeywell’s Flight Sentinel dispatch and datalink offerings.
Airworthiness directives issued last week by U.S. and Canadian authorities are targeting unrelated yaw and pitch control system problems experienced by certain Bombardier regional jets.
FAA Administrator Michael Huerta is appealing to general aviation pilots to make sure they’re “ready to fly” before they embark on a trip. The appeal came in an open letter to the general aviation community underscoring that the troubling accident rate has captured the attention of the highest levels of FAA. FAA often puts out safety alerts to operators with common sense advice on piloting aircraft, but they typically don’t come directly from the administrator.
Revo Models Colonial C-1, Colonial C-2, Lake LA-4, Lake LA-4A, Lake LA-4P, and Lake LA-4-200 airplanes. [Docket No. FAA-2012-0845; Directorate Identifier 2012-CE-013-AD; Amendment 39-17431; AD 2013-08-14] – supersedes an existing AD that currently requires a one-time, dye-penetrant inspection of the horizontal stabilizer attachment fitting and repetitive visual inspections of the fitting for any evidence of fretting, cracking, or corrosion (with necessary replacement and modification); replacement of the fitting upon reaching the 850-hr.
The San Antonio Airport system will honor the late aviation pioneer and entrepreneur Durrell Unger “Dee” Howard by renaming South Terminal Drive as Dee Howard Way in a June 3 ceremony. The west airport access road runs just south of the giant red-orange hangars built by Howard in the 1960s through 1980s. It is now owned by MRO and completions giant ST Aerospace.
BOMBARDIER Model CL-600-2C10 (Regional Jet Series 700, 701, & 702), CL-600-2D15 (Regional Jet Series 705), and CL-600-2D24 (Regional Jet Series 900) airplanes [Docket No. FAA-2013-0370; Directorate Identifier 2013-NM-034-AD] – proposes to require cleaning the crew oxygen system. This proposed AD was prompted by a report that traces of oil could be found in the crew oxygen system due to the use of incorrect pressure testing procedures during manufacturing.
A rotorcraft industry once characterized by rugged individuals flying simple machines is seeing an influx of technology not witnessed since the Vietnam War. Introduced at the top end of the market, in larger helicopters for demanding offshore oil-and-gas and search-and-rescue operators, new technologies are spreading down the size range as costs and weights fall so more customers can see the safety, performance and economic benefits.
While London will always be identified with certain touchstones of long tradition—The Tower, The Tube, The Few and undercooked bacon, among them—the British capital is vibrant with change, as its thicket of construction cranes attests. The Shard and London Eye have reshaped the city's skyline. Last year's Olympics drew global attention and applause. The royals are flying commercial. 'Will that be beef or chicken, Ma'am?'
While news reports typically point to the public's perception of excess and greed as the primary threat to corporate business jets, there are other forces equally insistent on robbing executives of their winged chariots—engineers.
PrivatAir has announced at Abu Dhabi Air Expo 2013 that it has signed a contract with Saudia Private Aviation (SPA) that will encompass training SPA's existing cabin crew as well as coaching in specific areas of on-board service.
Eclipse Aerospace and South Africa's National Airways Corporation (NAC) are celebrating type certificate validation from the South African Civil Aviation Authority (SACAA) for the Eclipse Twin-Engine Jet.
FlightSafety International's first AgustaWestland AW139 full-flight simulator has entered service at the company's Learning Center in Lafayette, La. The first Initial Pilot course using this new Level D qualified simulator is now underway. The simulator is equipped with a Honeywell Primus Epic avionics suite configured for single- and dual-pilot operations. It features a four-axis autopilot, GPS with Wide Area Augmentation System (WAAS) capabilities, a Traffic Collision Avoidance System (TCAS), and an Enhanced Ground Proximity Warning System (EGPWS).
Hawthorne Global Aviation Services is adding its third location in a little more than a year with the recent acquisition of development rights at Chicago Executive Airport. Hawthorne, which teamed with Moelis Capital Partners in 2010 to build a nationwide fixed-base operation (FBO) chain, closed on a deal May 6 to acquire the rights from Sovereign Development Group and hopesto begin construction later this month on a nearly 40,000-sq.-ft. terminal and hangar facility.
The Southwest Airlines flight had been uneventful, but shortly after the Boeing 737 touched down at Los Angeles International Airport on Sept. 8, 2009, the right main landing gear's inboard wheel and brake assembly separated from the aircraft. The pilots managed to taxi the jetliner off the runway and onto a taxiway where all 142 occupants deplaned. Airfield crews recovered the sizeable broken components that upon examination revealed fatigue cracking emanating from the brake mounting bolt-hole.
Beechcraft hopes to sell most of its jet programs by midyear. Chairman and CEO Bill Boisture said earlier this year that the programs have attracted a fair amount of interest and recently told Wichita reporters that he expects a bidding process to begin shortly. Options exist for the programs, ranging from a support organization buying the lines to maintain the existing fleet, to a manufacturing operation purchasing them to bring them back into production.
When Blain Stanley, international operations director at Aircare FACTS Training, begins a class on cabin emergency training for flight crews, he asks the pilots — many of whom have described their passengers as “Type A's” — if they think their charges would be assets or liabilities during an emergency. According to Stanley, the nearly universal answer is the latter.
