Pan Am International Flight Academy (PAIFA) has followed its SimCom acquisition with the purchase of Reflectone Training's centers in Herndon, Va., and St. Louis. PAIFA will take possession of four Level C simulators (one BAe 146, one Jetstream 31/32, and two Jetstream 41s), and has signed long-term leases on both facilities. ``This acquisition clearly states our intention to emerge as a leader within the regional aircraft training market,'' says Pedro Sors, PAIFA's president and CEO.
The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. and FlightSafety International each awarded a $5,000 scholarship to Geoffrey Connick (second from left), who attends Aviation High School in Long Island City, N.Y. Both companies presented the checks at the annual Aviation Week&Space Technology Laureates Hall of Fame Dinner held in April at the Smithsonian Institution Air and Space Museum in Washington, D.C. Connick will pursue a career in aircraft maintenance engineering and plans to attend Parks College at St. Louis University in Cahokia, Ill. Currently, Connick flies a Piper Warrior.
The National Air Transportation Association (NATA) has questioned the need for ``Q-STAR,'' a new aviation safety audit program offered by the Flight Safety Foundation (FSF). According to the Washington, D.C.-based trade group, charter operators are already besieged by companies offering audit services, which are scarcely justified considering the ``statistically insignificant'' frequency of fatal accidents among on-demand operators.
Meteorologists spend a lot of time delving into the mysteries that cause things to exit the bottoms of thunderstorms -- rain, wind, microbursts and lightning. Lately, it's what comes out the top of a cell that gets their attention. A brand-new phenomena was revealed in late May by researchers at NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center. The researchers there study deep-space gamma-ray phenomenon such as pulsars, black holes, other galaxies, gamma-ray bursts and other exotic astrophysical objects.
Bombardier Aerospace will invest $30 million on a new hangar at its aircraft manufacturing plant at Montreal's Dorval International Airport. The 200,000-square-foot structure will accommodate up to 18 Canadair Regional Jet (CRJ) and Challenger 604 aircraft at a time, and will be used mainly for ``preflight and delivery activities,'' Bombardier says. Construction of the new facility began in June, and is scheduled for completion in spring 2000. Bombardier employs 11,200 people in Montreal, including 5,700 for its CRJ programs and 2,200 on the new CRJ700 (70-seat) variant.
A group led by Orlando-based Aviation Management Systems (AMS) has purchased Sabreliner's commercial aviation maintenance, repair and overhaul (MRO) operations. Sabreliner says it decided to sell its MRO business in order to focus on its corporate and government aircraft maintenance and small- engine overhaul operations. The transaction includes Sabreliner's facilities at Phoenix Sky Harbor and Phoenix Goodyear airports. These facilities can accommodate 26 narrow-body aircraft in more than 700,000 square feet of hangar space.
The U.S. Senate Appropriations Committee has asked the DOT to explore fractional ownership as an alternative to its ``inefficient'' fleet of administrative aircraft. In a report on the DOT's proposed FY2000 budget, the committee said ``fractional ownership of administrative aircraft could prove beneficial in reducing costs and inefficiencies of the aircraft in administrative roles,'' and also urged the FAA to establish a ``pilot program'' to study fractional ownership.
United Parcel Service (UPS) has renamed its II Morrow subsidiary UPS Aviation Technologies to mark its new emphasis on aviation technology products, including the ADS-B (automatic dependent surveillance -- broadcast) traffic monitoring system. UPS Aviation Technologies plans to triple its business within the next 10 years, by combining the parent company's financial muscle with Salem, Ore.-based II Morrow's research and development and marketing base.
United States Aviation has opened a new FBO at Tulsa International Airport that features a 40,000-square-foot hangar and 10,000 square feet of office and lobby space. United States Aviation is a newcomer to the FBO business, but has flown charters for the past 10 years. ``We built a fuel farm and a larger ramp area for the charter operation, so starting an FBO seemed the next logical step,'' says FBO manager Vince Nelson. The company's managed fleet includes a Falcon 20, a Learjet 25 and a CitationJet. A new Gulfstream V recently was added to its charter certificate.
The FAA has encouraged airlines to volunteer flight data recorder (FDR) information to aid in tracking safety trends, inciting resistance from pilots who fear the data could be used against them as an enforcement or litigation tool. In the latest example, Air Line Pilots Association has encouraged Northwest Airlines' pilots to boycott a company-sponsored program that calls for voluntary disclosure of safety-related events.
In August, Million Air St. Paul (formerly Executive Aviation), based at St. Paul Downtown Airport, plans to start construction on another 30,000-square-foot hangar. The FBO opened its new $4 million facility in December 1998 with 110,000 square feet of hangar space. The terminal building includes a lobby, sleep rooms and pilot showers.
Bombardier Aerospace has chosen Taiwan's Aerospace Industry Development Corp. (AIDC) to build the entire aft fuselage and empennage for its new Continental business jet. The Continental is slated for the ``super midsize'' business jet category, and will be positioned between the Learjet 60 and Challenger 604 in the Bombardier product line. The company is seeking commitments from prospective customers before formally launching the project, however.
The FAA has agreed to name a number of unpublished IFR route intersections in a bid to make navigation easier for ``glass cockpit''-equipped aircraft. According to the NBAA, identifying such intersections poses no particular problem for pilots flying ``round-dial'' aircraft, but can substantially increase the workload of crews navigating with FMS, GPS and other RNAV systems. ``Of particular note are the airway-to-airway, radial-to-airway and radial-to-radial routes where no named fix exists,'' the NBAA says.
Edited by Paul RichfieldFred George, in Paris Bombardier Launches Continental
Bombardier chose this year's Paris Air Show as the venue to launch the 3,100-mile range Continental, the firm's newest business jet. Notably, the Continental is the eighth new aircraft the firm has launched in the past five years, according to Michael Graff, president of Bombardier Aerospace.
Bombardier's 70-seat Canadair Regional Jet (CRJ) made its first flight on May 27 from Montreal's Dorval International Airport. Test pilots Craig Tylski and Chuck Ellis reached an altitude of 15,000 feet and an airspeed of 230 knots during the 128-minute flight. ``The whole flight went extremely well,'' Tylski says. ``The aircraft was easy to handle, and provided a very stable platform.''
Messing around in airplanes can be great fun, but it also can lead to disaster when we push the envelope too far. We all know that stress can lead to deterioration of flightcrew performance. Some research-ers have put a finer point on the matter by defining the phenomenon of SLOJ (sounds like lodge) -- Sudden Loss of Judgment. Typically this occurs, say the psychologists, when individual stressors pile atop one another leading to the collapse of sound thinking.
Keystone Helicopter is selling its Keystone Engine Services unit to Turbomeca in a deal that will allow the engine manufacturer to establish a presence in the Northeast, while providing Keystone with capital to fund the expansion of its airframe maintenance business. The unit, which includes 21 workers, tooling, test equipment and machine tools, will remain at its location in West Chester, Pa., and the companies said they will work closely to integrate services.
Ministers from the European Space Agency (ESA) have agreed to proceed with a ``full definition program'' for the Galileo global navigation satellite system (GNSS). The decision indicates Europe's reluctance to rely upon the U.S. global positioning system (GPS), whose satellites are controlled by the U.S. Department of Defense. ESA has allocated $62.5 million for Galileo definition through the end of 2001, with an additional $190 million available for development through 2006.
A new initiative designed to cultivate interest in aviation maintenance careers has raised its first $15,000 and appointed an ``interim board'' of industry leaders. ``Make It Fly'' has a multi-part mandate: to organize a clearing house for aviation maintenance career information; to distribute parts and other training aids to vocational schools; to help military mechanics transition to civilian employment; and to inform young people that aviation maintenance is a viable career option.
British Aerospace plans to market its venerable BAe 146 quadjet as a replacement for larger Stage 2 aircraft -- BAC One-Elevens and Boeing 727s -- in corporate service. Two completion centers have expressed interest in converting the aircraft for the company and corporate shuttle market: Innotech- Execaire in Dorval, Quebec, Canada, and Trace Aircraft Completions in Kent, England. BAe says it also is developing a ``low utilization maintenance program'' for the BAe 146, tailored to operations that fly 400-600 hours per year.
Standard&Poor's is widely recognized as a leading provider of equity indices for investors. S&P indices are used by investors around the globe for investment performance measurement and as the basis for a wide range of financial instruments.
Airbus has begun flight testing long-range auxiliary fuel tanks on its Airbus Corporate Jetliner (ACJ) aircraft. The trials began on May 31, with a 5+55 flight from Hamburg, Germany to Toulouse, France, which included legs up and down the west coast of France. The ACJ is an A319 airliner with up to six extra fuel tanks in its cargo hold, providing a range of up to 6,300 nm with eight passengers. The ACJ also has higher-thrust engines (IAE V2500 or CFM56-5B), which enable it to reach FL 410, 2,000 feet higher than the stock A319.
