Search Results for: general aviation inc

The latest version of the House FAA funding legislation-H.R. 915 (known as the FAA Reauthorization Act of 2009) received a nod from the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee. The bill does not incorporate user fees, and is supported by most in the general aviation industry. Next in line is the House Ways and Means Committee, […]

In late November Eclipse Aviation filed for bankruptcy, and investors, suppliers, Eclipse 500 owners and order holders lost well over $1 billion. There has never been a financial failure of this scale in the entire history of general aviation. Eclipse investors have lost hundreds of millions, but individuals are also big losers. Anybody who had […]

A segment in President Obama’s budget proposal has opponents of general aviation user fees sounding the alarm. Page 129 of the budget “proposes repealing some aviation excise taxes and replacing these taxes with direct user charges.” The charges, generally a synonym for fees to use specific FAA services-including air traffic control-are said to total some […]

For the first time in five years general aviation airplane shipments declined with 3,969 airplanes delivered compared to 4,272 in 2007. Most of the drop occurred in the final quarter of the year, and the decline was limited to piston airplanes with both business jets and turboprops showing an increase. Piston airplane deliveries at 2,119 […]

One way that some instructors whet the appetite of prospective flight students is to take them on a short cross-country flight for a “hamburger” during the introductory flight. It usually works pretty well. The budding aviator returns from the flight brimming with excitement and anxious to share the experience with ground-bound friends and family. After […]

It was a cruddy day to go mountain flying. A ragged gray overcast stretched over Western Washington State, high enough to make for good VFR under the deck near Spokane, but it promised to be a more complicated journey to the east, where the spine of the Bitterroots juts out, rising to 10,000 feet at […]

In the years following the 9/11 attacks, Congress passed an accelerated depreciation tax incentive plan to boost sales of aircraft. It’s back; and the newly passed program joins some $1.1 billion in airport funding as part of the Obama administration’s economic stimulus package. The general aviation industry has lost a reported total of approximately 11,000 […]

Student pilots learn very early in their flying career how to avoid cloud and maintain visual reference to the ground. Even so, the classic case of a VFR pilot caught in IMC remains one of the most chilling scenarios in general aviation. The situation is made all the more critical when rising terrain is factored […]

The building that houses the Oakland Flight Service Station is nothing remarkable — just a square concrete structure at the northern end of Oakland Airport’s North Field. But it’s surrounded by history. Old, clapboard buildings from World War II line the airport frontage road that leads to the station. And side streets still carry names […]

The news stories were hard to miss: On February 13, 2008, a go! Airlines flight crew, already weary from prior days of cycle-intensive flying, felt the warmth of the sun through the cockpit windscreen as they guided their 50-seat Bombardier regional jet to Hilo from Honolulu. The captain felt he just had to close his eyes for a minute; he succumbed, as did his first officer. The next thing they knew, ATC was calling. The flight was already well past the destination after some 20 minutes of snoozing, the crew mumbled something about radio problems, turned around and landed safely. They later conceded to investigators they had slept through prior calls. The first officer even noted he could hear the calls in his sleep-he just couldnt respond. go! Airlines, a division of Mesa Air Group, suspended the two pilots that day; in April the airline terminated them citing evidence that both airline pilots apparently fell asleep on the flight deck. The outcome for other sleepy pilots has too often been more tragic than comic. Even though studied to near exhaustion, the insidious effects of fatigue, sleep interruption and sleep deficit continue to plague pilots in their planes. You dont need to be an airline or corporate pilot, flying multiple segments two and three days in a row, to find yourself struggling to stay awake in the cockpit. You dont even need to fly long leaps across multiple time zones. Fatigue sets in from issues as innocuous as a business or vacation trips with upset routines-later bedtimes, earlier rising, more late-night alcohol or unusual eating times all can contribute. Even something as simple as disrupted rest cycles for two or three days contributes to a sleep deficit. And like financial deficits, a shortage of good rest must eventually be repaid. If not, the body may force compensation against your will-and next thing you know, youre asleep at the yoke.