News

The first FAA-conforming HondaJet has successfully completed its first flight, Honda Aircraft Company announced on Tuesday. The flight took place on Monday at about 3:30 p.m. local time at the company’s base at Piedmont Triad International Airport in Greensboro, N.C. The HondaJet flew for 51 minutes while the crew conducted systems checks and evaluated flight […]

Hawker Beechcraft Corporation announced on Tuesday that it has reached a formal agreement with the Kansas state government to stay in Wichita for another 10 years. In return for a $40 million incentive package, the company said it will maintain its current product lines in Wichita and retain at least 4,000 jobs through 2020. “Today’s […]

Extra Aircraft has chosen an exclusive distributor in Australia to introduce the Extra 500 Spirit to the Asia-Pacific market, the company said recently. Extra Aviation Australasia, based at Brisbane’s Archerfield Airport in Queensland, will provide sales and support for the six-seat, pressurized, carbon-fiber turboprop, with plans to provide a service center in each of Australia’s […]

When President Barack Obama visited Hawaii for Christmas 2009, it practically shut down general aviation on the island of Oahu for two weeks, but this year the temporary flight restriction is much less onerous. Last year, flight schools were shut down and tour operators were grounded, costing the locals about a half-million dollars in lost […]

Boeing’s February delivery date for the first 787 will likely be pushed back at least to May and possibly to August or later, according to recent news reports citing opinions from industry analysts and company employees. Boeing is expected to announce the delay by the end of this month. Problems with the 787’s Rolls Royce […]

FlightPrep’s online flight planning patent could very well stand up to a court challenge, says pilot and patent attorney Lionel Lavenue. In an exclusive podcast interview with AVweb, Lavenue says the emotion and sentiment being expressed by those angered by FlightPrep’s preliminary efforts to enforce the patent mean little in front of a jury. Much […]

The Navy gave Alan Klapmeier and Kestrel Aircraft a Christmas gift late last week when it opened a runway at the soon-to-be-former NAS Brunswick in Maine to allow the prototype Kestrel single-engine turboprop to land. It was the first arrival at the base in almost a year. Kestrel is leasing 93,000 square feet of a […]

click for larger version It’s been a rough couple of months for the A380 fleet and the latest incident, although far less dramatic than the uncontained engine failure of a Qantas super jumbo, could nonetheless ground an Emirates A380 for months. It was felled by a catering truck at Toronto’s Pearson International Airport and speculation […]

A New Jersey pilot and his passenger came uncomfortably close to becoming metaphors for their mission when the Cessna 182 they were in crashed on takeoff from Greenwood Lake Airport Saturday. The aircraft is owned by Last Wish LLC, which specializes in scattering the cremated remains of those who’d like to spend eternity as part […]

RunwayFinder owner Dave Parsons says he will fight the patent awarded FlightPrep for online flight planning. In a blog post Parsons says he thinks he’s found enough holes in the patent to defend his service’s technology against it. “I think there is a clear path toward fighting the lawsuit against RunwayFinder, and potentially a way […]