News

Worldwide, bird strikes cost airlines about $1.2 billion per year in repairs and downtime, according to the UK Central Science Laboratory, but new radar software designed to distinguish between the radar returns of birds and insect swarms may improve upon that. Serge Zaugg of the Swiss Ornithological Institute worked with colleagues across France, the Netherlands […]

Boarding an aircraft could be seven times more efficient, saving airlines and passengers time and so potentially improving the income potential and quality of life for both, according to astrophysicist Jason Steffen of the Fermilab Center for Particle Astrophysics in Illinois. Challenging the current standard of loading passengers in blocks from the back of the […]

Gulfstream’s largest and most advanced aircraft will offer the longest range and fastest speed in the Gulfstream fleet, a full flight envelope protection fly-by-wire system and a host of other industry “firsts.” The 11- to 18-passenger G650 can fly 7,000 nautical miles at .85 Mach (or 5,000 nm at .9 Mach). Its maximum operating speed […]

The FAA yesterday issued two emergency airworthiness directives affecting general aviation aircraft. The first, (AD 2008-06-52), applies to Thielert Aircraft Engines GmbH (TAE) model TAE 125-02-99 engines with a serial number from 02-02-1500 through 02-02-2279. Although the AD only mentions installations on some Cessna 172 and (Reims-built) F172 series (STC No. SA01303WI) airplanes and Diamond […]

Lockheed Martin computer programmers are trying to figure out why a planned software upgrade to FS21 caused the system to crash late Tuesday night. AVweb received a tip from a former briefer in Michigan that the system went down at about 0100Z. A spokeswoman for Lockheed Martin told AVweb that when they realized the FS21 […]

Ellen Evak Paneok, of Anchorage, who died March 2 at age 48, was the first Native Alaskan woman bush pilot, and accumulated more than 15,000 hours of flight time, much of it along Alaska’s remote northern coast. She delivered mail and supplies to Eskimo villages in all kinds of weather. “The most challenging part,” she […]

The families of nine young skydivers who died last October when a Cessna 208B Grand Caravan crashed in Washington state have sued Cessna, the Seattle Post-Intelligencer reported on Monday. “They [Cessna] had the numbers of each plane that had a miscalibrated warning system on it and did not contact the owners of those planes,” lawyer […]

A Las Vegas television station reported that Silver State Helicopters owner Jerry Airola failed to appear in federal bankruptcy court on Tuesday, disappointing nearly 200 former students who showed up hoping to confront him. Airola has kept a low profile since the once-burgeoning flight school abruptly ceased operations at its 34 nationwide locations in early […]

On March 3 the Office of Inspector General for the Department of Transportation quietly released an audit on the use of the National Airspace System (NAS)-and the general aviation community is quietly taking notice. The audit, initiated by then Aviation Subcommittee Chairman Rep. John L. Mica, R-Fla., found that air carriers and non-air carriers, including […]

Palm Beach County commissioners have determined that the best way to boost tourism in the tiny community of West Palm Beach is to charge landing fees on the numerous private aircraft that use the local airport. The attitude of the commissioners is illustrated by the comment of one that the as-yet-undetermined fee shouldn’t be much […]