The Internal Revenue Service has agreed to suspend audits the agency has been conducting on aircraft management fees and services while the agency drafts new guidance on taxing management activities. The agreement follows another recent meeting agency officials held with industry leaders, who have been appealing to the IRS to hold off on action against management companies until the management-fee tax issue could be resolved.

General aviation groups this summer have agreed to highlight skills to avoid loss-of-control incidents as part of a multi-pronged effort to stem the recent increase in accidents that has raised the concern of industry, FAA and the National Transportation Safety Board. FAA last week held a meeting with a number of general aviation stakeholders to look at both short-term and long-term initiatives to help turn the accident rate, which has been stubbornly flat over the past five years and up in the past six months.

While Dassault’s business jet deliveries dropped in the first quarter, the French manufacturer expects shipments to improve throughout the year and remain on track to reach the highest total in three years. Dassault expects to deliver 70 Falcons this year, up slightly from the 66 delivered in 2012 and 63 in 2011, company executives say. As Dassault worked to certify its newest Falcon 2000 models, deliveries were down nearly 50% in the first quarter to eight, compared with 15 in the first quarter of 2012.

Beechcraft has received the latest renewal for the U.S. Air Force/Navy Joint Primary Aircraft Training System (JPATS) program, a $210 million contract for 35 T-6 trainers. The renewal, which is for the 19th production lot, will carry JPATS production at least through February 2015. The latest order, which comes in the face of sequestration cuts, includes 33 T-6 aircraft for the U.S. Navy and two more for the U.S. Army. Deliveries on Lot 19 will begin this month.

The used market has crawled out if its trough from 2009, when a high of about 17% of the business jet fleet was up for sale, but it has come at a cost as aircraft values continue to plummet, industry experts say. The used market hit an all-time high in 2012 with the number of transactions reaching 2,240. This bested the 2007 peak of 2,181 aircraft transactions, JetNet reports. And the number of aircraft for sale has declined over the past three years, reaching 13.4% by the end of 2012.

EasyJet has flown a ton of volcanic ash from Iceland to the U.K. to prepare for final tests to gain commercial certification of the Avoid (Airborne Volcanic Object Identifier and Detector) ash-detection technology by the European Aviation Safety Agency (EASA). The low-cost carrier is partnering with Airbus and Nicarnica Aviation, a spin-off company of the Norwegian Institute for Air Research, to test the Avoid system at high altitude and prepare for the industrialization of the technology.

Low-fare carrier Norwegian is entering the long-haul market

JetBlue ponders ways to push the boundaries of its model.