Business & Commercial Aviation

NetJets Europe has partnered with The London Heliport, the capital's only Civil Aviation Authority-certified heliport, and has rebranded it NetJets London Heliport with prominent signage touting the fractional operation, along with its sister company, Executive Jet Management, in the building and around the landing site. More than one-third of NetJets' European customers are based in London.

With a global shortage of airline pilots forecast, CAE is tackling the problem head-on, and in June announced new and extended cadet training agreements with India's IndiGo, CityJet of Ireland, China's Shenzhen Airlines and Norwegian Airlines.

The average age of a business jet in Europe is 26, according to research from Global Jet Capital, an aviation finance specialist. Sixteen percent of the mid-to-heavy private jets in Europe are age 20 years or older and 8% are at least 30 years old. Consequently, there is a significant market in Europe for private jet owners considering an upgrade of their aircraft, Global Jet Capital said.

Lufthansa Technik and DC Aviation Group, a European operator of business jets, have signed a cooperation agreement.

ExecuJet has acquired its first fixed base operation in the Caribbean region. The FBO is located at Princess Juliana International Airport in St. Maarten. The FBO was acquired from TLC Aviation.

Jet Aviation has added eight aircraft to its global management fleet in the past two months, including two Gulfstream G650s and a G550, an Airbus to its managed fleet in EMEA and Asia, two Dassault Falcon 2000s, a Sikorsky S-76 helicopter and a Global Express in the U.S. Jet Aviation manages 300 aircraft worldwide. Jet Aviation Business Jets, an air carrier certificate holder, is based in Zurich. Jet Aviation Flight Services is based in Teterboro, New Jersey.

West Star Aviation in Charlotte, North Carolina, was named an authorized dealer of hardware sales and installation of SmartSky technology.

Jet Support Services, which provides hourly cost maintenance programs for business aircraft, has formed a partnership with Global Jet Capital, a financing provider for large-cabin, long-range private jets.

Jet-A And Avgas Per Gallon Fuel Prices May 2016

BCA's editor-in-chief William Garvey talks with Bill Koch, chairman of Hawthorne Global Aviation Services.

The pilot breed has in it the primal instinct to attempt every assigned task, no matter the odds of success. Like many of our innate urges, this proclivity must be kept in check because in an airplane, acting on it can be deadly.

Sheltair has acquired Tampa Jet International Center at Tampa International Airport, Florida, and plans to expand its infrastructure. The operation and location is expected to fit into Shelter's growth model and complements its network of fixed-base operations.

In February 2002, a Gulfstream V underwent maintenance at a repair station at West Palm Beach Airport in Florida. The airplane was placed on jacks for a tire change. During the process, a maintenance tech disabled the weight-on-wheels, aka "squat" switches with wooden "Popsicle sticks" to simulate that the GV was in "ground mode" so he could access the Maintenance Data Acquisition Unit in the cockpit to troubleshoot a false overspeed warning problem.

Former Royal Air Force aviator O.W. "Wally" Epton, with nearly 17,000 hr. of stick time specializes in conducting functional check flights and training other pilots how to do the same in a responsible and knowledgeable way.

BCA contributor James Albright, who authors the "http://code7700.com" website, advises using qualified pilots and mechanics on functional check flights.

Aviation lore veritably brims with tales of the fearless test pilot flying into harm's way to probe the limits of an experimental airplane's performance, the quintessential scenario being the flutter dive. You know the scene: Pull up, Buck, pull up!

Two young men, both aspiring for aviation careers, were killed on March 24, 2014, at about 1738 when the Piper Seminole PA-44-180 they were piloting broke up in flight and crashed into a salt marsh near Brunswick, Georgia. The NTSB determined that the accident probably resulted from the pilots losing control of their aircraft while flying in stratiform instrument meteorological conditions (IMC) at 8,000 ft. MSL.

The pilot and two passengers were killed on the afternoon of May 3, 2016, when their Beech 35B Bonanza broke up and crashed in Syosset on Long Island, New York. The IFR flight originated in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina and was en route to Robertson Field (4B8) in Plainville, Connecticut.

The NTSB calls your attention to Advisory Circular AC 91-75, a Safer Skies initiative recommendation authored by the FAA and the industry that highlighted vacuum system failures as a significant cause or contributor to fatal accidents in IMC.

The inspiration for "mercy missions" traces back to Nov. 19, 1946, when an off-course American C-53—the paratroop version of the DC-3/C-47—with four crewmen and eight military VIPs aboard crashed into the Swiss Alps. All survived, but they were stranded in deep snow on a high glacier with no means of self-extraction.

The invention of the nickel-cadmium (NiCad) battery, which had less gas output and more reliable power than its lead-acid predecessor, was a major catalyst toward allowing aircraft to fly higher and faster.

Michimasa Fujino, founding president and CEO of Honda Aircraft Co. Inc, is understandably proud of the new HondaJet. He has personally guided its progress from initial conception to a fully developed model and certified aircraft, fighting through at least five years of delays in the process.

Selected accidents and incidents in April 2016. The following NTSB information is preliminary.

The 2,000-lb.-thrust-class GE Honda HF120 is one of the most advanced engines in its class, having a 4.5:1 thrust-to-weight ratio, 2.9:1 bypass ratio and 24:1 pressure ratio. It's also one of the quietest and lowest exhaust emission engines in its class.

Lithium ion main batteries are becoming more and more common but not without teething troubles. A number of high-profile safety incidents have given the technology a black eye. The danger of thermal runaway is a serious issue and if you have the technology installed in your aircraft you need to keep up to speed.