News

Actually, NetJets is trying to grab customers away from its competition and its latest efforts involve publishing two new guides, “Private Aviation 101” and “How to Pay for Your NetJets Share.” The new publications “supplement and enhance” — according to NetJets — the company’s newly revised “Buyers Guide to Fractional Aircraft Ownership” and “The Aircraft […]

The latest addition to Signature Flight Support’s growing network of fixed-base operations (FBOs) is the former Million Air facility at the Jacqueline Cochran Regional Airport (TRM) in Thermal, Calif. The newly acquired facility is the chains second location in the popular Palm Springs resort area, joining Signatures operation at Palm Springs International Airport (PSP). The […]

Citing 2005 as the best year yet for sales of its PC-12 single-engine turboprop, Pilatus Aircraft announced late last month that the company delivered 80 PC-12 business turboprop aircraft to retail customers around the world. The 80 deliveries were comprised of 61 aircraft in North America, 10 in Europe, 4 in South Africa, 2 in […]

Gulfstream Aerospace this week said it appointed Gerard Schkolnik as director of its supersonic technology programs. In his new position, Schkolnik will direct the companys research of structural concepts and advanced materials, propulsion integration and supersonic aerodynamics as they apply to supersonic flight. He will also continue the company’s research into sonic boom suppression and […]

Adam Aircraft last week announced that Craig Johnson has joined the firm as Chief Operating Officer. Johnson, who comes to the company from Northrop Grumman, AlliedSignal, McDonnell Douglas and General Dynamics, was brought in to meet what Adam Aircraft called “the demand of the company’s strong growth” as it accelerates A500 production and starts delivering […]

Eclipse Aviation on March 1 said it has begun building the first Eclipse 500 jet for delivery to a customer. In a ceremony witnesses by a crowd of employees, the first customer, David Crowe, stepped up to engage the friction stir welding of one of his future jets cockpit side panels and to drill window […]

Sino Swearingen Aircraft Corporation (SSAC) last week announced completion of another major milestone before starting deliveries of its SJ30-2 business jet: completion of airframe icing tests. According to the company, the final flight test was completed on March 1 and included simulating a 45-minute hold in maximum continuous icing conditions. The flight was crewed by […]

Raytheon Aircraft Company last week said it had received FAA certification of the newest member in its Hawker business jet family, the Hawker 850XP, a growth version of the venerable marque. The 850XP’s major innovation is the addition of winglets to the basic and highly successful Hawker 800 series, which Raytheon says is part of […]

It’s relatively easy for even casual observers to conclude that the reason for the ATA’s keen interest in user fees is to somehow reduce competition from the general and business aviation industry. Of course, it’s no great secret that non-scheduled aircraft operations have consistently increased in the past few years as airline delays have increased […]

Are the various proposals calling for new user fees to be imposed on some types of general aviation operations — turbine aircraft, for instance, but not piston-powered ones — designed to weaken opposition to them from among the non-scheduled portion of the aviation industry? Is all of this designed to drive a wedge between certain […]