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
Synthetic Vision Systems (SVS) are coming on strong for one simple reason. Anyone who has ever flown an Instrument Competency Check (ICC) ride under the hood in VFR conditions knows that "One peek is worth a thousand cross-checks." One quick look at the outside world instantly clears up any confusion regarding aircraft attitude, proximity to terrain and obstructions, and distance to go to the runway, among other critical elements of situational awareness.

Fred George
In the early 1960s, Ed Swearingen was in the modifications business, but he longed to start his own line of aircraft. He envisioned three families of aircraft that would share the same fuselage cross section and many systems. The Merlin I would be a piston twin, powered by two new 400-hp geared, turbocharged Lycoming engines; The Merlin II would be a turboprop and the Merlin III would be a light jet.

Fred George
The safety benefits of head-up displays have been proven for more than two decades in civil aircraft and even longer aboard military platforms. Up until now, though, all civil aircraft HUD installations were single-sided, providing an excellent situational awareness tool for the captain, but leaving the first officer in the dark. Most OEM airframers have deferred developing dual-HUD installations because they claim that customers opting for one HUD won't cough up the extra money for the second.