Business Aviation

A 1997 Citation X owned by Donald Trump has been flying with an expired FAA registration since Jan. 31, according to a story in today’s New York Times. Flying with a lapsed registration — which costs $5 for three years — could be a problem in the case of an accident, and also can subject […]

Environmental groups have filed suit (PDF) against the EPA to try and force the agency to set emissions limits for all aircraft. The suit was filed by Earthjustice (on behalf of the Center for Biological Diversity) and Friends of the Earth on Thursday, saying the EPA has “delayed unreasonably” coming up with rules for aircraft […]

As the FAA slowly plies through the process of approving an unleaded replacement for 100LL, Swift says it believes its 100-octane unleaded fuel will have a comparable cost to current avgas. Swift was one of two fuels to emerge from the first phase of the FAA’s Piston Alternative Fuel Initiative testing late last month. A […]

I think if you explained to someone outside of aviation that, by the time we’re all done, it will have taken 10 years to develop a new, unleaded, high-octane aviation gasoline, they’d believe you to be making it all up. And that doesn’t count 30 years of half-serious research on the topic hardly worthy of […]

Alaska Air, based in Seattle, has agreed to acquire San Francisco-based Virgin America for $2.6 billion, the companies announced this week. “With Alaska Airlines’ strong foundation in the Pacific Northwest, and Virgin America’s California hubs … [the combined airline will offer] more than 1,200 daily departures to destinations across North and Central America,” Alaska Airlines […]

Assembly of the unique Airlander lighter-than-air transport vehicle is now complete, Hybrid Air Vehicles announced today. The ship was shown off to visitors, fully inflated and hovering, inside the hangar in Bedfordshire, U.K. The next step will be a ground-testing phase, then it will roll out of the hangar to start an extensive flight-test program. […]

According to GAMA statistics, there are 611,000 active pilots in the United States and only 223,000 registered general aviation aircraft. Even allowing for air taxi airplanes, clubs and partnerships, this means that lots of us are flying airplanes that we don’t own. Some of us rent from local flight schools, some borrow from friends. Few […]

Textron Aviation has confirmed that all its U.S. sales are being handled by factory representatives. That would appear to be the end of the extensive dealer network that sold Cessna aircraft for decades. Nikki Riemen, Textron’s media and public relations manager for the piston and defense division, said the company is “focused on developing and […]

Heli-Expo, the annual event hosted by Helicopter Association International, opened in Louisville, Kentucky, this week, with about 700 exhibitors and 60 helicopters on display. Two aircraft being shown for the first time are Bell’s flight-test vehicles for the 525 Relentless and the 505 Jet Ranger X programs. Bell officials said they have nearly 80 letters […]

As part of AVweb’s Features, we’re starting an occasional series on innovators who are making a difference in general aviation—the young guns of GA, so to speak. We’ll be doing interviews with them where they can talk about what they’ve done and their vision for the future of the area of general aviation where they […]