Fred George

Chief Aircraft Evaluation Editor

San Diego, CA

Summary

Fred is a senior editor and chief pilot with Business & Commercial Aviation and Aviation Week's chief aircraft evaluation pilot. He has flown left seat in virtually every turbine-powered business jet produced in the past three decades.

He has flown more than 195 makes, models and variants, ranging from the Piper J-3 Cub through the latest Boeing and Airbus large twins, logging more than 7,000 hours of flight time. He has earned an Airline Transport Pilot certificate and six jet aircraft type ratings, and he remains an active pilot. Fred also specializes in avionics, aircraft systems and pilot technique reports.

Fred was the first aviation journalist to fly the Boeing 787, Airbus A350 and Gulfstream G650, among other new turbofan aircraft. He’s also flown the Airbus A400M, Howard 500, Airship 600, Dassault Rafale, Grumman HU-16 Albatross and Lockheed Constellation.

Prior to joining Aviation Week, he was an FAA designated pilot examiner [CE-500], instrument flight instructor and jet charter pilot and former U.S. Naval Aviator who made three cruises to the western Pacific while flying the McDonnell-Douglas F-4J Phantom II.

Fred has won numerous aviation journalism awards, including NBAA’s David W. Ewald Platinum Wing Lifetime Achievement Award.

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Articles

Fred George
Falcon 900 series aircraft now have been in production for 24 years, a testament to their classic design qualities and the willingness of Dassault Aviation to make continuous improvements. The 900 was the idea of the late Frank Wisekal, former head of U.S.-based Dassault Falcon Jet. Wisekal wanted an aircraft that could compete with the 3,700-nm range, large-cabin Gulfstream III and 3,400-nm range Canadair Challenger 601.

Fred George
The sixth-generation head-up display from Rockwell Collins’ Portland, Ore.-based HGS division (nee Flight Dynamics) is an active-matrix LCD-based system using LED illumination. As a result, it offers far higher resolution than earlier CRT projection systems, the brightest imagery and the widest field of view of any commercial available HUD, according to Rockwell Collins. HGS-6000 systems are considerably more compact than CRT-based systems, affording 50 percent more headroom below the projector assembly.

Fred George
Rockwell Collins’ RTA-4100 weather radar is a breakthrough technology that provides pilots with hands-free weather threat detection. This 17-pound wonder automatically scans hundreds of cubic miles of airspace ahead of the aircraft to detect storms as far away as 320 nm. With Fusion systems equipped with an 18-inch radar, such as Global Vision, the weather avoidance range is greater than 320 miles. The RTA-4100 also has a Doppler turbulence detection mode that has a 40-mile maximum range.