Holiday Gifts

Despite all the gloom and doom about piston-powered general aviations future youve probably heard lately around the FBOs coffee pot, the industry actually isnt doing too badly. Three data points that became available late in 2017 bear this out.

Joseph E. (Jeb) Burnside

Sunday, December 17, 2017 at 12:00 AM ET

Verified

Key Takeaways:

General aviation's fatal accident rate dropped below one per 100,000 flight hours for the first time in over 50 years in 2016, reaching 0.96.
Piston-powered aircraft shipments saw positive growth in Q3 2017, with piston-powered airplanes up 4% and rotorcraft up 13.1%, despite overall flat sales for new aircraft.
Avionics sales increased by 4.1% in Q3 2017, primarily driven by a 28.3% surge in the retrofit market due to the approaching ADS-B Out mandate.

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Despite all the gloom and doom about piston-powered general aviation’s future you’ve probably heard lately around the FBO’s coffee pot, the industry actually isn’t doing too badly. Three data points that became available late in 2017 bear this out.

The first one is explored in greater depth in this month’s Quick Turns department, beginning on page 20: If the preliminary numbers hold up, general aviation’s fatal accident rate dropped below one in 100,000 flight hours for the first time in more than 50 years. That announcement came courtesy of the NTSB, which published its preliminary 2016 numbers in November 2017. The NTSB’s preliminary fatal accident rate for 2016 is 0.96 per 100,000 flight hours.