CAPITOL HILL has a little more than a week left to either provide another temporary extension of FAA’s funding authority or pass a full-blown reauthorization bill. The House and Senate in June passed the sixth short-term extension of FAA authorization and aviation excise taxes, pushing the deadline to Sept. 30. Lawmakers are believed to be negotiating another short-term extension that would be in effect for six months to a year. The extension is expected to be included in a comprehensive Continuing Resolution that would fund the entire government beyond Sept.
ARINC DIRECT expanded its SKYLink broadband satellite communications network to include coverage of most of the Caribbean and Central America as well as part of South America. ARINC worked with SES AMERICOM to expand the Ku-band coverage of Satellite NSS-7, and to work toward transitioning to the SES AMERICOM AMC-21 satellite in the fourth quarter of 2008. SKYLink provides Ku-broadband communications to business jets equipped with the Rockwell Collins eXchange product line. The SKYLink service was already in place for the territory from Europe to North America.
JOSEPH W. PALLOT was named general counsel of HEICO Corp., Miami, Fla. and its subsidiaries. Pallot, 48, has been a member of HEICO’s board of directors since 2004. He resigned his board seat to accept the general counsel’s post. Since 2000, Pallot has been a shareholder with Devine Goodman Pallot Rasco & Wells, P.A., a Miami transaction and litigation law firm. He was a partner in another law firm from 1993-2000 and before that had a career in the commercial banking industry.
EMBRAER delivered the first of nine Embraer 170s to French carrier Régional – Compagnie Aérienne Européenne, a wholly-owned subsidiary of the Air France Group. The aircraft is configured in a 76-seat single-class layout, and will be operated on domestic and intra-European networks. Regional is Embraer’s largest customer in Europe, operating a fleet of 48 EMBRAER 190s, ERJ 145s, ERJ 135s and EMB 120 Brasilias.
Hangar space for lease at the Van Nuys Airport. Maguire Aviation is in the process of developing 460,000 sq. ft. of hangar and offices for single and multiple tenant occupancy. Please contact Mike McDaniel or Tim Wray for more information at 800-451-7270. Click here to view the pdf
BOMBARDIER CL-600-2B19 (Regional Jet Series 100 & 440) airplanes [Docket No. FAA-2008-0977; Directorate Identifier 2008-NM-124-AD] – This proposed rule would require modification of the refuel/defuel system in the center wing fuel tank, per the instructions of Bombardier Service Bulletin 601R-28-053, Rev. C (dated March 14, 2006). This proposal, which resulted from an MCAI originated by Transport Canada, was prompted by the results of a Bombardier safety review of the aircraft’s fuel system.
JUSTIN BRIGGS joined Alerion, Inc., Family Office of Flight, as director of sales. Briggs will be responsible for expanding the charter services company’s reach in Western markets. Alerion was founded a year ago to provide services for corporate, family and individual travel. Briggs formerly held charter and jet membership sales positions with Sentient Flight Group, ACM Aviation, TAG Aviation and Raytheon. He has worked with a range of customers, including some from the professional sports and entertainment industries as well as Fortune 50 companies.
TONY QUEENAN was hired as vice president of sales for Satcom Direct Communications, Inc. of Satellite Beach, Fla., a provider of aeronautical voice, fax and Internet data service to the U.S. government. In his new role, Queenan will be responsible for government and military sales into the aviation and land-mobile markets. Queenan has nearly 25 years of professional sales experience. He was most recently senior director of sales for ARINC.
September 15-18 – Arinc’s Flight Simulator Engineering and Maintenance Conference, Hilton Salt Lake (Utah) Center. For more information call (410) 266-2008 or see www.arinc.com October 6-8 – National Business Aviation Association, 61st Annual Meeting & Convention (NBAA2008), Orlando, Fla. For more information, contact NBAA www.nbaa.org/2008 October 27-30 – Flight Safety Foundation 61st International Air Safety Seminar, Sheraton Waikiki, Honolulu, Hawaii. For more information call (703) 739-6700, www.flightsafety.org
WILLIAM BROWN III was named manager of security services for the Savannah, Ga. facilities of Gulfstream Aerospace. Brown spent 14 years in the U.S. Air Force specializing in operational security and related fields. Most recently, Brown worked for the Pentagon Force Protection Agency as assistant director of its Pentagon Access Control Division. Brown holds a bachelor’s degree in criminal justice and a master’s degree in business administration, both from American InterContinental University.
TOM NEUFELDER was named vice president of engineering for Avidyne Corporation. Neufelder previously served as vice president and general manager for independent practice engineering for General Electric’s Healthcare organization in Plano, Texas. He also led the engineering organization for GE Medical System’s Invasive Cardiology business and worked in the development of defense avionics systems and ground-based air traffic control radar equipment while serving as a senior engineer at Westinghouse Electric Corporation in Baltimore, Md.
SCOTT SHIELLS was named airframe program director for StandardAero. Shiells will be responsible for developing plans to grow the airframe maintenance, repair and overhaul business. He joins StandardAero from Duncan Aviation, where he was project manager on maintenance and modification projects. He also has served as director of maintenance for Steen Aviation, worked in field service for Lockheed Support Systems, and was an engine technician and flight engineer in the U.S. Navy.
RTI INTERNATIONAL METALS, INC. amended and restated its credit agreement to provide for a $225 million term loan and a $200 million revolving credit facility, increasing total domestic credit availability from $240 million to $425 million. Principal payments on the term loan will begin in 2010. The agreement has a four-year term expiring in 2012. The expanded credit line will be used to “finance our already committed capital projects and to enhance the company’s liquidity position,” said Dawne Hickton, vice chairman and chief executive officer of RTI.
AVIATION RESEARCH GROUP U.S. last week was successful in convincing the Lehigh County Court in Pennsylvania that it acted properly in changing its rating of East Coast Jets. ARG/US had previously given East Coast Jets a “Platinum” rating, but changed the operator’s classification to “Unrated/Not Rated” after a Hawker 800 operated by East Coast Jets crashed July 31 while attempting to land at the Owatonna, Minn. Airport (BA, Aug. 4/51).
STEWART TOYE was named director of business development for the Eastern Hemisphere, including Europe, the Middle East and Asian markets, by DeCrane Aerospace. Toye, who is based in DeCrane’s facility in England, has most recently been European business development and technical manager for DeCrane Aerospace Audio International and DeCrane Aircraft Seating.
Sabre Holdings – the Southlake, Texas-based parent company of Travelocity, the Sabre Travel Network and Sabre Airline Solutions – has acquired Flight Explorer, the McLean, Va.-headquartered provider of real-time tracking, reporting and display of en route aircraft.
CAE, the Montreal-based provider of simulators and training, named Bill Dolny as vice president and general manager of CAE SimuFlite in Dallas. CAE also appointed Michael Fedele as vice president and general manager of its training center in Morristown, N.J. Both men will report to Tom Stelter, who was named vice president of CAE Training and Services & Innovation, North America.
BOMBARDIER DHC-8-400 series airplanes [Docket No. FAA-2008-0356; Directorate Identifier 2008-NM-042-AD; Amendment 39-15661; AD 2008-18-04] – Requires replacement of all barrel nuts on the four primary front-spar wing-to-fuselage attachment joints and application of a compound to those nuts and bolts. This AD supersedes an existing directive (AD 2008-04-02) which required inspections of those barrel nuts for cracks and replacement of hardware if the nuts were cracked or the preload was incorrect.
THE HOUSE Homeland Security and Foreign Affairs Committees took the Transportation Security Administration to task for failing to meet an Aug. 3 deadline for developing a standardized threat and vulnerability assessment program for general aviation airports. The missed deadline was one of several highlighted in a report prepared by the majority staffs of the two committees: “Wasted Lessons of 9/11: How the Bush Administration Has Ignored the Law and Squandered Its Opportunities to Make our Country Safer.” See article on Page 124.
EMBRAER ERJ 170 and ERJ 190 airplanes [Docket No. FAA-2008-0562; Directorate Identifier 2008-NM-010-AD; Amendment 39-15658; AD 2008-18-01] – Requires operators to conduct a visual inspection of the left-hand bulkhead blowout panel of both the forward and aft cargo compartments to determine whether the pressure equalization valves are installed. If any valve is not present, install one in accordance with the instructions of Embraer Service Bulletin 170-21-0032 or 190-21-0019 (both dated Aug. 10, 2007).
CHRISTOPHER CRUM joined ServiceElements as new business developer and strategist. Crum has more than 25 years of management responsibility in the business aviation industry, having held executive posts with AlliedSignal Engines, Garrett Aviation and Stevens Aviation. Most recently, he was president and CEO of Royal Jet Group, LLC, an international charter and aviation services company based in Abu Dhabi, UAE. During his time in the Middle East he also was a founding board member of the Middle East Business Aviation Association (MEBA).
FEDERAL AVIATION ADMINISTRATION proposed changing the applications for Airport Improvement Program grants to require nonprimary airport sponsors to include a list of fixed- and rotary-wing aircraft based at the airport. FAA said discretionary grants are made on a number of factors, and airport sponsors that do not provide verifiable data on the number of aircraft hinder the agency’s ability to determine the necessity of the grant. The agency added it would consider the failure to provide a list of based aircraft as a factor when making discretionary funding decisions.
The Transportation Security Administration is planning to release a survey later this year that will be used to develop a standardized threat and vulnerability assessment program for general aviation airports, according to the House Homeland Security and Foreign Affairs Committees. The program, however, will come months after the congressionally mandated Aug. 3 deadline. The Implementing Recommendations of the 9/11 Commission Act of 2007 directed TSA to develop the threat and vulnerability assessment program for GA airports by Aug.
A brand new Robinson R44 II helicopter was destroyed on its delivery flight from the factory last month when it crashed under unknown circumstances. The accident occurred Aug. 29 at about 1615 CST and involved N41411, which was in cruise flight near Ridgedale, Mo.
All three crewmembers aboard a 1962 model Lockheed SP-2H Neptune firefighting airplane were killed this month when a fire started in one of the aircraft’s four engines shortly after takeoff and the plane crashed and burned.
