While the vast majority of all aircraft accidents still occur in the landing phase, research shows that nearly all pilots who fly professionally ignore company policies regarding go-around procedures. Why pilots ignore the policies and decide to land is lesser known. But William Curtis of Canadian research firm Presage says, “No other single decision can have such an impact on the industry accident rate.”

The National Transportation Safety Board will lose one of its longest-sitting members with the departure of Chairman Deborah Hersman on April 25. Hersman announced March 11 that she is leaving to become president of the National Safety Council. Hersman was appointed to the safety board as a member in 2004, filling the slot vacated by John Goglia, and became chairman in 2009. In a low-profile agency that in the past frequently grappled with board vacancies, fewer than a handful of people have served a decade or longer.

Asia's millions of newly wealthy citizens are keen to travel, and new low-cost carriers are boosting fleets and routes to serve them. But the region's air traffic regime is inconsistent and non-homogeneous—which is why Singapore is taking steps to develop more localized air traffic management expertise.

With contracts awarded for designs of initial supersonic X-plane concepts, NASA's High Speed Project is working on a new set of foundational technologies, instrumentation and test techniques that will prepare the way for its development later this decade. “The High Speed Project feels the next major step is to build a flight demonstrator, and we're trying to do everything we can to be prepared for when the time comes,” says Tom Jones, High Speed Project deputy project manager at NASA Armstrong Flight Research Center at Edwards AFB, Calif.

In the last decade, Congress has moved increasingly toward the use of multi-year contracts to save on big-ticket defense programs. But the Pentagon's current long-term budget plans call for stopping the purchase of Sikorsky MH-60 helicopters one year before its current fixed-price, multi-year agreement expires. That prompts the contractor to raise the specter of the decision reversing the trend in multi-year contracting.

Delta moves toward renewing its long-haul fleet

Tom Captain is vice chairman of Deloitte LLP and is based in Seattle

Emissions regulations apply only to Europe through 2016