Aviation News

The safety statistics for 2008 did not bring good news to most turbine operators. Part 91 operations by owner-pilots saw accidents and fatal accidents more than double. According to safety analyst Robert E. Breiling Associates, owner-flown business aircraft were involved in 29 accidents last year, of which 14 involved fatalities. That contrasts with 2007, when […]

When no qualified bidders emerged last week, the scheduled auction for the assets of Eclipse Aviation was canceled by bankruptcy court judge Mary Walrath. That cleared the way for EclipseJet Aviation International, a subsidiary of Luxembourg-based ETIRC Aviation, to acquire the company. The deal was approved verbally by the judge on Tuesday and signed off […]

Economics be darned, Cessna is on track with new product development at all levels. Its Model 162 SkyCatcher light sport aircraft is finalizing its test program, with certification and first deliveries scheduled for later this year. The company has incorporated extensive ground vibration testing for the composite airframe, even though it is not required, to […]

No pilot could possibly reflect on the one-in-a-million emergency landing in New York’s Hudson River without imagining himself or herself in the pilot’s seat. We all hope we could remain as calm as the heroic pilots and crew that day. We also hope we have prepared ourselves as completely as we can for this, or […]

John Winant, the first president of the (then) National Business Aircraft Association, died at his home in Massachusetts January 14. The former Sprague Electric vice president was 85. Winant is remembered as the driving force that took NBAA (now the National Business Aviation Association) from 824 member companies to close to 3,000. An original member […]

With some $3 billion earmarked for airport and aviation infrastructure improvements by the incoming Obama administration, general aviation could expect to receive better than one-third of the funding. That translates to more than $1 billion for GA. The $3 billion figure comes from an executive summary of a House Democrats’ stimulus package released January 15 […]

If there was any doubt that the current financial crisis is hitting general aviation hard, the latest round of announcements from manufacturers should reinforce the bad news. The new year will get off to a lousy start for some 2,000 employees at Cessna. In a memo to employees, company management announced a second round of […]

Over the holiday period, a reported several hundred XM Weather subscribers were unable to access the service through their Garmin handheld GPS navigators (service to my personal GPS 396 remained unaffected). Garmin has issued a software update to address the issue, and it is available as a free download to customers, as are all software […]

French industrial conglomerate Daher has completed its acquisition of a 70 percent stake in Socata, the Tarbes, France-based manufacturer of the TBM 850 single-engine turboprop. The marriage is seen as a win-win, since Daher stands to further its reach into the aerospace field. The company already has involvement in aerospace, automotive, defense and nuclear industries. […]

Still facing reduced production (eight aircraft per week from 16), Cirrus had some good news in the form of FAA approval for flight into known icing (FIKI). In a press ‘Webinar’ on Monday, company management also outlined a series of marketing strategies for the coming year, including defining a series of option-package levels (S, GS […]