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AerCap Accelerates Growth With ILFC Bid

Industry trade groups are urging the FAA to put the brakes on a well-intended guidance-streamlining effort that would result in mass cancellation of official agency interpretations that are not housed in one of three online repositories.  The FAA’s move, outlined in a Dec. 3 memorandum from Flight Standards Service (FSS) Director John Duncan to all FSS employees, would cancel any guidance not found in the Flight Standards Information System, the Regulatory and Guidance Library, “or elsewhere on www.faa.gov,” effective January 14, 2014.

The European Aviation Safety Agency (EASA), citing a “redefined” risk assessment, is halving the proposed compliance window for operators of Rolls-Royce-powered Airbus A330s to replace an incorrectly manufactured thrust reverser component. The proposed directive, released Dec. 18, would give affected operators 12 months to replace thrust reverser door cowl hinge sleeves Nos. 3 and 4. The proposal replaces a September draft directive that would have given operators 24 months. EASA says the parts in question were not correctly heat treated.

Industry leaders remain hopeful that the long overdue repair station security rule will finally shake free from its White House review in the next few weeks, but they are still calling on newly confirmed Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson to make sure that happens.

Aviation Week and the Balamand Institute of Aeronautics are conducting a confidential survey to quantify the training needs and capacity for aviation maintenance technicians, engineers and specialists in the Middle East. 

The FAA, going beyond NTSB recommendations, is giving Boeing 757 and 767 operators five years to modify their aircraft to prevent inadvertent battery depletion when a particular backup power mode is activated.

Skyrocketing numbers of narrowbody aircraft orders have turned attention to Southeast Asia—and its burgeoning low-cost carriers (LCCs), in particular. Twenty-seven percent of the world’s narrowbody aircraft—half the global fleet—are operated in the Asia-Pacific region, estimated Lufthansa Technik Philippines in the first quarter of fiscal 2013. More than 37% of the total commercial fleet will soon be based there, many of them in service with low-cost carriers, it also projects.