News

Federal officials Wednesday confirmed earlier reports that signals from a nationwide broadband system proposed by LightSquared will significantly disrupt existing GPS service. In separate statements, the National Coordination Office for Spaced-Based Positioning, Navigation and Timing (PNT), the Department of Defense and the Department of Transportation essentially said that under current circumstances, GPS cannot coexist with […]

A District Court Judge has ordered the United States to pay $4.4 million to the family of a pilot killed in a 2005 plane crash after finding that a controller (currently serving as a front line manager) “breached his duty of care.” Judge Edwin G. Torres found that controller Harvey Pake failed to provide accurate, […]

A 55-page report this weekend made public a laundry list of flaws currently dragging on the F-35 fighter program and is complicated by a production plan called “Concurrency” that allows Lockheed Martin to churn out the jets while testing continues. Structural cracks, electrical gremlins and a “classified” problem are among those mentioned in the report. […]

American Airlines is the first U.S. airline to be officially approved by the FAA to use iPads as an electronic flight bag in all phases of flight, the FAA said this week. The airline received the approval on Dec. 1. The FAA said only two iPads are allowed to be operated in the cockpit at […]

J. Lynn Helms, who served as FAA administrator from 1981 to 1984, died on Dec. 11, at his home in Westport, Conn., at age 86. Helms may be best remembered for his role during the 1981 strike by air traffic controllers. According to the Washington Post, Helms advised Reagan administration officials that air traffic safety […]

The FAA’s AeroNav charting division told vendors this week that it proposes to charge end users of digital charting producers about $150 a year to close a $5 million shortfall in its budget due to declining paper chart sales. The new fee, if adopted, would presumably more than double the cost of some popular iPad […]

Hawker Beechcraft is looking for a break from the holders of a $182 million revolving line of credit as it grapples with the rough economy. According to Bloomberg, the Wichita planemaker, jointly owned by Goldman Sachs and Onex Corp., is close to violating the terms of the loan agreement in which its cash flow must […]

Aircraft designer Burt Rutan has teamed up again with investor Paul Allen — who bankrolled Rutan’s winning entry in the 2004 X Prize — to build what they say will be the world’s largest airplane, “Stratolaunch,” capable of launching payloads into space. The composite aircraft, weighing 1.2 million pounds, with a 385-foot wingspan, resembles an […]

Pilots of transport-category airplanes should be taught to reduce the angle of attack as their first response to a stall warning, the FAA said on Tuesday. In a new proposed advisory circular, the FAA says it aims to provide “best practices and guidance for training, testing, and checking for pilots to ensure correct and consistent […]

LightSquared has offered to give up control of part of the frequency spectrum it owns in exchange for unconditional use of another part of the L-band frequency for its controversial proposed broadband network. In a proposal to the FCC (PDF), LightSquared says it will cede veto power over the use of half of its spectrum […]