New legislation passed through the House Tuesday (by a 411-0 vote) calling for a restructuring of the FAA's Part 23 certification requirements for the purpose of expediting approvals for safety improvements. The Small Airplane Revitalization Act aims to remove bureaucratic barriers to evolutionary progress within the industry (for the introduction of new designs and the addition of improvements to old ones); to cut certification costs for manufacturers; and to give manufacturers more responsibility in the certification process. Read More

The NTSB Thursday released the first in a series of videos highlighting circumstances and decision-making that have led to GA accidents with fatal outcomes and seeks to identify and reduce risks for GA pilots. Four more videos will follow. The videos, dubbed Video Safety Alerts, by the NTSB all run less than 5 minutes in duration. Each is based on one of five safety bulletins issued by the NTSB in March and each video features an investigator discussing specific aspects of general aviation safety that have been associated with a high volume of GA accidents. The videos are intended to provide strategies and resources to help pilots better identify risks and improve safety within the GA community. The first video "Is Your Aircraft Talking to You? Listen!" is available on YouTube and also here, after the jump. Read More

British inventor Alan Bond will reportedly receive more than $90 million from the British government to further develop technology for a hybrid jet-rocket engine that he expects will be capable of more than 3,500 mph in flight. Bond runs Reaction Engines, which seeks to develop a reusable space plane dubbed Skylon. The vehicle's performance hinges on its synergistic air-breathing rocket engine (SABRE) and new highly efficient and lightweight heat exchanger technology. At speeds near Mach 5, Bond says the SABRE engine would see intake air temperatures near 1000 degrees Celsius. According to Reaction Engines, testing has shown that the engine's recently tested heat exchanger is capable of cooling air by more than 1,000 degrees Celsius in less than the 1/100th of a second that it takes to pass through the engine -- and without producing frost. The cooling is essential for the engine's operation. Read More

According to the CDC, the weight of the average American has significantly increased since 1960 and that may be starting to have an impact on air medical transport providers, especially those that operate helicopters. The average weight for men aged 20-74 rose nearly 30 pounds over four decades ending in 2002, according a CDC report. And while some medical service providers are reporting that they're being forced to deny service to some passengers due to their weight, the percentage remains relatively small. Meanwhile, one commercial airline has been able to apply a different, more profitable, approach to accommodating plus-sized passengers.  Read More

GreenWing International Monday announced that German certification of its single-seat eSpyder may mark the aircraft as the first electric airplane to be certified by a national authority, and the company expects to bring details and pricing information to EAA AirVenture Oshkosh 2013. The eSpyder, which resembles a more conventional ultralight with tube and fabric construction, will be offered as a complete aircraft in countries that recognize the DULV certification applied by Germany (the U.S. does not). In this country, GreenWing plans to release an Experimental Amateur Built kit and hopes to bring a Light-Sport version of the eSpyder to market pending the creation of regulations for electric aircraft. GreenWing says the eSpyder has regularly achieved one-hour flight times during testing, and can be fully charged in 90 minutes following a shorter 45-minute flight. GreenWing is a new company, but the products it sells are not new -- and neither is the German certification. Read More

Healthy GA pilot volunteers are needed this year at AirVenture for computer-administered confidential testing to help the FAA determine when previously injured pilots are safe to return to flying. The FAA requires cognitive screening tests to help determine when a pilot who has suffered a stroke, head, or brain injury can be considered safe to return to the cockpit. Read More

Deer Trail, Colorado, is expected to vote August 6, on an ordinance that would sell hunting licenses and provide rewards to its citizens for destroying federal property if it appears overhead in the form of an unmanned aerial drone. The ordinance was drafted by town resident, Phillip Steel. It states that Deer Trail will offer $100 rewards to shooters licensed (at the cost of $25) if they produce specific identifiable parts from an unmanned aerial vehicle "known to be owned or operated by the United States federal government." Read More

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Investigators are now looking at the ELT aboard the Ethiopian Airlines Boeing 787 as a possible cause for the fire that heavily damaged the airliner at Heathrow Airport last week. The ELT is located in the area that was scorched by the fire. Read More

John Guimond, an airport manager in Maine, and Ron Cote have responded to a fatal aircraft accident by working to develop a fixed-base audio recorder for the purpose of capturing radio transmissions at small airports. The pair has set a (perhaps surprising) price for their device and may have already earned support from Maine's DOT and the FAA. Read More

Aviation Consumer's Paul Bertorelli walks through the features of Hilton Software's latest release of WingX Pro on the iPad. Read More

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