News

Piper Aircraft is planning for a 40-percent decline in production for 2009 and should not have to lay off any more workers if the estimate is accurate. According to TCPalm, Piper CEO Jim Bass told the Indian River County Commission that 150 employees have been laid off and others have had their hours cut to […]

China is planning to develop its own jet engines to power the commercial airliners and perhaps business jets it plans to build in coming years. Foreign investment in the $878 million venture is being capped at 30 percent, with state aircraft builder Aviation Industry Corp (AVIC) holding 40 percent and the remainder to be split […]

The first public appearance by the “hero of the Hudson” could be at the most publicized event of the year. President-elect Barack Obama has invited Flight 1549 Capt. Chesley Sullenberger to his inauguration on Tuesday. Sullenberger has been kept under wraps by authorities investigating the dramatic ditching of the US Airways A320 in the Hudson […]

Jeffrey Skiles is the kind of guy who’d give you the shirt off his back if you needed it. And that, says his mother Deloris, explains why one of the passengers interviewed after being rescued from Flight 1549 was wearing the tunic with the three stripes that clearly identified it as coming from Skiles, who […]

It’s not often that a manufacturer is sued for allegedly defective products it hasn’t built in almost 60 years but that’s where Northrop Grumman finds itself. Chalk’s Ocean Airways and its insurer AIG is suing the company over the crash of one of Chalk’s Grumman Mallards in December of 2005, claiming the 58-year-old aircraft wasn’t […]

While much of the country will be absorbed by the events in Washington, Tuesday, a bankruptcy court in Delaware will be hearing arguments for and against the purchase of Eclipse Aviation by a company owned by its current chairman. The hearing into the proposed sale of the company to a Luxembourg-based subsidiary of ETIRC Aviation, […]

A first look at ATC tapes and crew interviews revealed Sunday that US Airways Flight 1549 suffered a dual engine loss a mere 90 seconds after takeoff. Quoting from the ATC transcript, the NTSB’s Kitty Higgins said at 3:27:32, the flight was instructed to turn left to 270 degrees. The crew responded: “Ah, Cactus 1549 […]

Click for larger size The NTSB said over the weekend that the first officer of US Airways Flight 1549 clearly saw the formation of birds seconds before they were ingested in the Airbus A320’s engines, causing immediate loss of thrust and an eventual ditching in the Hudson River. The NTSB said Saturday that interviews with […]

Cessna and Cirrus have both repackaged their products — Cessna has renamed its low-wing piston singles (under previous ownership, the Columbia 350 and 400) as the Cessna 350 Corvalis and 400 Corvalis TT, while Cirrus has announced new options for its product line. Cirrus announced integrated TKS weeping wing technology, automotive style windshield de-ice fluid […]

The FAA has released a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking that would “enhance tradition training programs” for Part 121 crew and pilots by requiring simulator training and additional requirements “in areas that are critical to safety.” The proposed rules would provide more frequent recurrent training to co-pilots than captains, as the FAA aims to prepare a […]