University of North Dakota Aerospace Foundation, Grand Forks, N.D., a nonprofit corporation that serves as a link between industry and the John D. Odegard School of Aerospace Sciences, named Charles Pineo marketing and sales director. Pineo was previously a regional manager of corporate and agency sales with Northwest Airlines.
On the mitigation side of a laser illumination event, the FAA's advice is of a practical nature: Don't look at the laser. Don't lose control of the aircraft trying to protect your eyes or evade the beam. Get ATC clearance before deviating from your course and altitude. If there's been an illumination event near you in the past 20 minutes, don't fly over that same location.
Premier Air Center in East Alton, Ill., has acquired West Star Aviation of Grand Junction, Colo. A full-service FBO located at St. Louis Regional Airport (ALN), Premier is a Cessna Service Center for all 500 and 650 series Citations and is FAA-certified on all Dassault Falcons. West Star is an FBO offering a complete array of aircraft services including airframe modification and maintenance, exterior paint, interior redesign and refurbishment, avionics installation and repair, and fuel services.
In Colombo, Sri Lanka, a King Air 300 was used by NGOs to commute between Medan/Banda and Aceh/Mobulah/Jakarta in Indonesia. In Sri Lanka a King Air 200 and a Puma helicopter flew a variety of missions out of Colombo. ``In both Sumatra and Sri Lanka, we are now flying medical teams, supplies and assessment teams to places not before reached,'' said Air Serv President Stuart Willcuts, who was in Colombo. Contributions to aid the tsunami victims may be sent to Air Serv's Virginia offices, or can be made at www.airserv.org.
The fly-by-wire Antonov An-148 made its maiden flight on Dec. 17, 2004. A 75- to 90-seat derivative of the An-72/-74 utility aircraft, the An-148 differs in that its engines are slung below its high wings, while the AN-72's are atop its wings. It is powered by 16,500-pound-thrust ZMKB Progress D-436T powerplants. The aircraft took off from Svyatoshin airfield close to Antonov's plant at Kiev, reaching 10,000 feet in the 81-minute flight that was cut short by worsening weather.
Cessna broke ground Dec. 21, 2004, for the company's $20.4 million expansion to its Independence, Kan., facility that will support production and delivery of Cessna's single-engine piston aircraft line and its new entry-level business jet, the Citation Mustang. The expansion will include a 90,000-square-foot flight/delivery building and an 11,000-square-foot aircraft completions building. In addition, Cessna will expand its current customer delivery center by 11,000 square feet. Cessna says the construction will be completed by this December.
Midwest Executive Aviation has opened its fourth U.K. FBO at Edinburgh Airport and is to open another at Birmingham International Airport on March 1. At the two new locations, Midwest will be head to head with Signature Flight Support, which took over the Menzies/Execair chain of European FBOs in late 2004. In fact, at Birmingham, Midwest's offices and lounges will be directly above Signature's in the same building but will have their own ramp access.
ARINC received an STC for its new eFlightDeck EFB system installed on a Boeing 727 for ASTAR Air Cargo, Inc. It is the first deployment of the company's Class II EFB by a commercial carrier, and, according to ARINC, is the first EFB system ever to support ACARS data link. ARINC plans to complete a deployment on ASTAR's fleet of 25 Boeing 727s, nine McDonnell Douglas DC-8s and seven Airbus A300s by the end of this year.
An era ended in Wichita as Russ Meyer, Cessna Aircraft's longtime chairman, finally stepped down. In a message to Cessna employees, Textron Chairman Lewis Campbell wrote that after ``30 years of distinguished leadership at Cessna, Russ Meyer has elected to retire as chairman.
The TSA announced that it and the NBAA are accelerating their partnership to further enhance the Transportation Security Administration Access Certificate (TSAAC), a program providing corporate aircraft operators with an approved security program (see Washington, page 81). The TSAAC provides standardized security procedures and best practices for personnel, facilities, aircraft and inflight operations of business operators who on a voluntary basis will help extend TSA oversight.
Aviation Partners Inc., a Seattle-based provider of blended winglets, has received an STC for its Hawker 800XP winglet system, which significantly enhances the operational performance of the twinjet. ``Blended winglets transform the standard, 2,600-nm Hawker 800XP into a 2,780-nm-capable aircraft,'' said Gary Dunn, Aviation Partners' vice president of sales. ``A blended winglet equipped Hawker 800/Hawker 800XP will climb higher and cruise faster -- at any given cruise weight -- than the original airplane, while saving 7 percent in fuel burn.''
Stevens Aviation, Greenville, S.C., appointed Mark Niehaus general manager of its Denver service center. Niehaus was most recently director of service sales support and engine programs for Bombardier Business Aviation Services.
Million Air Dallas, Addison, Texas, named Martin J. Dyer director of flight operations. Dyer comes to Million Air with an extensive flying background, including over 6,500 total flight hours.
Meanwhile, Chapman Freeborn Airchartering of the United Kingdom reported NGO personnel were using business jets on mid-term lease deals to organize relief aid across the vast affected area. A company representative also said that airliners and business jets had been chartered through them to repatriate stranded tourists.
Fletcher Aldredge, the Shawnee Mission, Kan.-based publisher of Vref aircraft value reference, sees a common thread in the current market for previously owned aircraft: ``Virtually 100 percent of the dealers and brokers we interviewed are optimistic about 2005.'' Aldredge made that comment in the fourth quarter 2004 edition of his Market Leader newsletter.
McAlpine Helicopters of Oxford Kidlington Airport delivered its first VIP-configured Eurocopter EC135. Both this and a second, for delivery in March, are destined for undisclosed Irish customers. McAlpine, the U.K.'s Eurocopter distribution, completions and maintenance center, has more of the $5.23 million VIP EC135s scheduled for delivery to Ireland in the second half of this year. The EC135s are supplied in a five-seat corporate interior layout with or without a bar and take around 20 weeks to complete, depending on the specification and the degree of complexity.
Cessna Aircraft released service bulletins that will allow installation of the Honeywell Runway Awareness and Advisory System in a variety of Citations. Cessna's Citation Service Center network will perform RAAS installations and associated certification work for all Bravos, Encores, Excels and Xs.
On Dec. 10, 2004, an MU-2B-60 operated by Flight Line, Inc. of Watkins, Colo., crashed while maneuvering near Denver's Centennial Airport (APA). The FAR Part 135 freight flight was on an IFR flight plan in night VMC. The airline transport-rated pilot and pilot-rated passenger died. (See ``Accidents in Brief,'' page 78.) Mitsubishi Heavy Industries America (MHIA), Honeywell, Hartzell Propeller and the FAA were assisting the NTSB in the investigation.
Aviation Fabricators (AvFab) received STC approval for its King Air 300 and 350 commuter passenger seats. The company already holds commuter seat STCs for the King Air 90, 100 and 200 series. No airframe modification is required other than removing the existing seats and furnishings and sliding the new high-density commuter seats into the existing seat rails. Complete installation instructions, diagrams, and weight and balance are included with each kit. The seats come painted, and can be fitted with foam and upholstery for an additional fee.
MD900 helicopters -- Reduce the life limit of certain Notar fan system tension-torsion (TT) straps. Also, at specified intervals, remove each TT strap and perform a visual and x-ray inspection, replacing any unairworthy part before further flight. Report the discovery of any unairworthy TT strap.
There have been several recent incidents in which airline pilots reported being ``hit'' with laser beams while in flight. These reports are unsettling because of their potential implications -- are the flights being targeted? Do the lights themselves pose eye damage? The fact is that lasers -- an acronym for ``Light Amplification by Stimulated Emission of Radiation'' -- are becoming a common element in modern life. They're everywhere, as this Jan. 5, 2005, NOTAM makes plain: !FDC 4/1765 ZLC MT. BOZEMAN, MONTANA.
Bombardier has received regulatory approval from the European Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) to upgrade the Learjet 45 with the Honeywell TFE731-20BR engine. The certification clears the way for Learjet 45 operators in EASA's 25 member countries to use a service bulletin, along with revisions to the aircraft flight manual, to upgrade their aircraft at Lufthansa Bombardier Aviation Services in Berlin, Germany. According to Bombardier, the engine upgrade gives the Learjet 45 ``significantly reduced balanced field length under hot and high conditions.''
The Embraer 175 airliner was granted its type certificate from the Centro Tecnico Aeroespacial (CTA), the Brazilian civil aviation regulatory agency. The Brazilian manufacturer expects EASA certification shortly, followed by Transport Canada Civil Aviation authority approval in the first half of this year. The EMB175, which is 70 inches longer than the EMB 170, is the second of Embraer's new four-member jet family to be awarded type certification.
Everyone knows what a laser is, right? It is a bright, focused light. Actually there is a lot more to it than that. First, laser is an acronym for ``Light Amplification by Stimulated Emission of Radiation.'' Second, there is that part about ``radiation.'' In this case, radiation is used to indicate energy transfer and not a level of radioactivity.
A detailed analysis of the past year's corporate/executive accidents involving turbine-powered aircraft will be included in the 2004 edition of Breiling's Annual Business Turbine Aircraft Accident Review, to be published later this year. Copies of the 2003 edition, which contains an analysis of accident involvement by make and model of aircraft, are currently available. For more information, contact Robert E. Breiling Associates at 765 N.E. 35th St., Ste. B, Boca Raton, FL 33431, or call the company at (561) 338-6900; fax: (561) 393-2387.
