Anderson Leveille grew up in Stowe, Vt., and got his first high-school job in the circa-1820 sawmill his dad owned. There were no blueprints or tolerance gauges, so maintaining the wooden teeth on the mill's bevel gears, which were lubricated with sheep tallow, taught Leveille the value of creative engineering.

Pilots still talk of flights across the Atlantic Ocean—one of the busiest international sectors in aviation—as “a crossing.” It implies an element of voyaging into the unknown. In air traffic management (ATM) terms, it also involves something a bit less romantic: changing flight information regions (FIR) at least three times and arriving into an air traffic system unlike the one from which the aircraft departed.

Air traffic surveillance is set to extend from Europe to North America for the first time thanks to satellite-based coverage that is being established across the northern reaches of the Atlantic. Although the program has run into delays, when finally completed it will yield major safety and efficiency gains for key international air routes.

Passengers stranded due to Spanair's decision to stop operating at the end of January are home, and ticket holders who never made their trips have until April 15 to try to get reimbursed. The airline, which ceased operations due to “exceptional circumstances,” according to its website, has been under financial duress for years.

Distressed Austrian Airlines seemed to have been rescued for good when Lufthansa bought it in 2009, but three years later and with little restructuring success visible, its days seem numbered.

Standardizing air traffic management systems may be a crucial goal for Europe, but it will not be cheap—particularly for smaller nations. To help address this problem, a coalition of ATM providers is embracing a new way of upgrading their systems that will not only save money but also help advance harmonization.

Consider this the next time you grab a cup of coffee at the airport: The market capitalization of Starbucks exceeds that of the 12 largest U.S. airlines—combined. Soaring fuel costs pushed the average profit margin of those carriers down to 0.3% in 2011, or a still-meager 2% if you factor out American Airlines, which has been in Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection since late November.

The International Civil Aviation Organization obligates nations to undertake their lawmaking role in aviation and ensure that air navigation services are provided. A state can achieve this with a number of different management models, ranging from a service organization within its transport ministry, to outsourcing air traffic management functions to a commercial provider.