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While many recall the eerie feeling of a quiet sky above the U.S. in the hours after 9/11, that wasn’t the first time that all civil aircraft were grounded. Roger A. Mola, a researcher at Air & Space Smithsonian magazine, writes in this month’s issue that three times in the early 1960s, all civil air […]

New technologies being developed in Europe would make it impossible for hijackers to fly airplanes into buildings, The Sunday Times reported on Sunday. Systems using biometrics, which scan irises and fingerprints, would prevent unauthorized users from gaining access to cockpits and from operating the airplane’s controls. If the airplane was headed for a collision with […]

Hazelwood said that UAVs now flying in Iraq already are operating in the equivalent of Class B airspace. Balad Airbase, near Baghdad, “goes 24/7, 365 days a year [and] intermingles armed aircraft, medivacs, commercial aircraft, Fedex, and 20 to 30 UAVs everyday, all day. It has never had a UAV accident,” he said. But some […]

The FAA needs to move more quickly to develop rules that would allow unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) into the National Airspace System, according to U.S. Army Col. Don Hazelwood. Speaking at a recent conference about UAVs in Orlando, Fla., Hazelwood said the technology is quickly improving, accident rates are down, and the unmanned systems are […]

AOPA says the Washington ADIZ should be a temporary measure, activated only when there’s a credible security threat to the capital, instead of the persistent thorn in the side that it has become. And effectively expanding its effects to 100 nm from the city through mandatory training should be off the table. In comments on […]

EAA says pilots have a lot of people to thank for their continued ability to hop in an airplane and take off for just about anywhere. In an analysis of the state of GA five years after the 9/11 terror attacks exactly five years ago, EAA says there are still annoyances and maybe even some […]

Although it can technically sell Mustangs now, Pelton said first customer deliveries aren’t scheduled until next year. Assuming Eclipse’s full certification is approved in the near future, it will likely be the first to get a VLJ into service. The Wichita Eagle said Eclipse announced in July that it would deliver 50 airplanes by the […]

Although it likely means little in the very light jet (VLJ) sweepstakes, Cessna won the race to full certification with the announcement that its Mustang VLJ (Cessna prefers the term entry-level jet) got the FAA blessing on Friday. (The Eclipse 500 was granted provisional certification in July.) The Mustang is now approved for delivery and […]

Mills said the initial suit is being filed on behalf of affected owners in California because of that state’s strong consumer protection laws. However, he said there are plans for a national class action suit (the California suit will remain separate) that will be filed in Lycoming’s home state of Pennsylvania. Assuming the courts accept […]

The claim appears to attempt to link this particular service bulletin with past recalls that the plaintiff alleges were the result of cost-cutting measures implemented by Lycoming in the mid to late 1990s that “altered the design of the engines and led to crankshaft failures.” (In 2005, Lycoming lost a legal battle with a supplier […]