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.
An aircraft's fuel system has a more profound effect on aircraft performance than any other airframe system. Without fuel, the mission inevitably comes to an abrupt stop and, unless the flight crew is very, very lucky, the ensuing forced landing will cause severe or catastrophic aircraft damage. That reality has been a great motivator for turbine aircraft designers, builders, maintainers and pilots for the past 60 years. Most fuel system designs, as a result, are very robust and very reliable in service, assuming they're properly maintained and operated.
By the mid-1970s, the light jet revolution was in full swing, with Cessna's Citation 1, Learjet 24 and the Dassault Falcon 10 taking center stage in the business aircraft market. These upstarts were problematic for Beech Aircraft because its existing King Airs lacked the ramp appeal and sporty performance offered by the new generation of light jets. King Airs were viewed by some as practical, utilitarian, efficient, responsible and, quite frankly, rather matronly.
Forty-eight hours before EBACE 2006 officially opened its doors to visitors, we made our final full-stop landing in Embraer's ERJ 190 flight-test aircraft at Geneva-Cointrin International Airport after a two-plus-hour demo flight. We taxied to a nondescript parking spot on the ramp, well away from the static display line adjacent to Palexpo, but well within eyesight of arriving conventioneers. Heads turned and people nattered about the unexpected presence of the big company-owned flight-test regional jet in Geneva.
