Business Aviation

A Canadian group is trying to get formal recognition for pilots as professionals in the same league as doctors, lawyers and engineers. Tom Machum, president of the College of Professional Pilots of Canada, told AVweb that if successful, the College would set and enforce standards for commercial pilots and provide needed input into regulations and […]

Texas will take over funding of air traffic control towers at 13 airports that will lose them to the federal government’s sequester cuts. The state’s department of transportation made the decision on Thursday but it won’t become official until the Texas Transportation Commission ratifies it. The commission is meeting in an emergency session next week […]

Former aircraft mechanic Joel Stout Thursday pled guilty to charges that involve a retired FAA examiner and falsified documents in a case affecting inspections that took place over a span of several years, last decade. Stout worked as an aircraft mechanic at the Flying Tigers aircraft maintenance facility at Donegal Springs Airpark in Marietta, Pa., […]

The Aircraft Electronics Association opened its 56th convention and trade show in Las Vegas Tuesday with an eye-opening number: $6.3 billion. That’s the current size of the avionics industry — including new installation and retrofits, but not repairs — according to a recently compiled economic study done by the association based on 2012 sales. The […]

If the tower at the local airport was supposed to be closed but wasn’t it’s because someone convinced the FAA that closing it would pose a threat to national security. At least 24 towers that would normally have been closed under the mathematical limits set by the agency before sequestration took effect (fewer than 150,000 […]

A 57-year-old Boeing project manager named Jonathan Standridge has decided to take a personal role in the rehabilitation of convicted airplane thief 21-year-old Colton Harris-Moore, aka the “Barefoot Bandit.” Harris-Moore is serving a seven-year sentence for crimes related to the boats, cars and airplanes that he stole or took on joy rides. Pending charges may […]

Thursday, Beechcraft announced that it has filed suit in Federal Claims Court “to contest the U.S. Air Force’s decision” to move forward with a $427 million contract awarded to Embraer/Sierra Nevada Corporation (SNC). The Air Force has twice selected the Embraer/SNC Super Tucano over Beechcraft Corporation’s AT-6 for its Light Air Support program, but Beechcraft’s […]

As we told you Monday the popular head of EAA’s homebuilder section Chad Jensen was dismissed from that position but EAA was still hopeful of finding a place for him in the organization. That apparently happened and Jensen is now Homebuilt Technical Specialist through EAA’s Member Services team. Read Jensen’s post on the Van’s Airforce […]

Critics that include the National Aviation Heritage Alliance (NAHA) and a senior curator for the Smithsonian Institution have refuted claims made this month and supported by Jane’s All the World’s Aircraft that Gustav Whitehead piloted a powered aircraft years before the Wright Brothers. The claim, which specifically stated that Whitehead first flew his original powered […]

The one-of-a-kind Orbis flying eye hospital will get an upgrade this year, transitioning from a DC-10 to an MD10 donated by FedEx. The flying hospital travels the world to deliver surgical eye care and training to people in poor countries, with a fully equipped surgical suite and staff on board the aircraft. “The new MD10 […]