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Aerion SST Orders Take Off
The Aerion supersonic business jet was formally unveiled in October 2004. Since then, the design has been under development with computer models and wind tunnel tests. The jet is designed to cruise at speeds up to 1.15 Mach over land without producing a boom on the ground, and at speeds up to 1.6 Mach in other areas. Over the continental U.S., where regulations require speeds below Mach 1, the aircraft can cruise efficiently just below the speed of sound. The aircraft will seat eight to 12 passengers and have a range in excess of 4,000 nautical miles, the company says. |
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DayJet Expands Network
The expansion comes 60 days after DayJet began revenue service and CEO Ed Iacobucci said in a news release that the convenience of the service and its ability to connect underserved markets is proving popular. "Since initiating service in October, the feedback from our membership base has been overwhelmingly positive," Iacobucci said. "Adding these 28 new destinations to our network not only gives members in our DayPort markets more travel choices, but also provides a powerful link between communities that today have no direct scheduled jet service." |
DayJet has added 28 destinations to its network across the Southeast based on what it says is strong customer demand for its "per-seat, on-demand" service using Eclipse 500 aircraft. The 28
destinations, mostly secondary airports in cities that don't have much scheduled service, can be selected as long as the start point or end point of a customer's flight is one of DayJet's five
original "DayPorts" — Boca Raton, Gainesville, Lakeland, Pensacola or Tallahassee.
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As Business Prospers, So Do Bizjet Makers
The world's top 20 companies are expected to earn profits of $22.5 billion in 2009 as they shake off the doldrums that were associated with the 9/11 hangover. However, the impact of 9/11 illustrated just how sensitive the market can be to that kind of uncertainty and Frosh and Sullivan is quick to point out that all bets are off if something of similar importance rocks the world in coming years. It also sees a lack of infrastructure, the shortage of finishing centers for aircraft and shortage of skilled workers as challenges facing the bizjet industry. |
Business analyst Frost and Sullivan says there's no end in sight to increased corporate profits so business jet manufacturers can expect to ride the current boom for some time. In fact, corporations
are so confident about future profitability, they're ordering jets in anticipation of having the money to pay for them. "Previously, the increase in demand for business jets lagged one to two years
behind corporate profit increases. At present, both the demand for business jets and the increase in corporate profits rise in tandem," Frost & Sullivan senior research analyst Rani Cleetez told
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| Private Jets Thriving in a Fractional Fleet | back to top | |
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Flight Options Gets Interest In Management Plan
The latest addition to the FIM fleet is a Hawker 800XP, a mid-sized jet with a 2,600-nm range and top cruise speed of 514 mph. Flight Options' fleet includes Citation X, Gulfstream, Challenger and Embraer aircraft. |
Flight Options now has three wholly owned private jets in its fractional fleet through a system it calls its Fractional Interchange Management (FIM) Program. Under the program, aircraft owners turn
over management of their planes to Flight Options, which adds them to the fleet of more than 130 fractionally owned aircraft under Flight Options' management. The aircraft earns revenue for the owner
while it flies for Flight Options and the owner has access to the company's fleet of 130 business aircraft.
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| A700 on Final Approach for Certification? | back to top | |
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Adam A700 On Track For 2008 Certification
To achieve type certification, Adam will need four type conforming test aircraft. CEO John Wolf said getting the first TIA is significant because most manufacturers who make it to that stage go on to achieve full certification. Next stop for the current test aircraft is Elgin Air Force Base where it will be pummelled with every type of extreme weather imaginable in the McKinley Climatic Chamber. |
Adam Aircraft says it's confident its A700 light jet will be certified by the end of next year, following the FAA's granting of the first Type Inspection Authority for the program. Adam got its first
type conforming A700 in the air in the spring and the TIA means that hours flown by FAA inspectors now count toward certification. "We have steadily moved from our first flight of the fully conforming
A700 this spring into FAA testing by taking advantage of the commonality with the already certified A500 twin piston as well as over 900 hours of development flying with the first two A700
prototypes," Adam President Duncan Koerbel said in a news release.
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You'll be glad you did!
| Can't Wait for to Train for Your New Eclipse 500? | back to top | |
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jetAVIVA Offers Eclipse 500 Training
Customers in the jetAVIVA program can choose three courses ranging from 10.5 to 45 flight hours. The most elaborate course offers clients training in maximum range trips and night operations. The company says the goal of the courses is to get Eclipse customers familiar with the aircraft before they take the mandatory type-rating course. The training is designed to ensure they'll ace the type rating. |
One of the bottlenecks Eclipse is dealing with is a backlog of training for its customers as their new jets roll off the assembly line. In a recent letter to customers, Eclipse CEO Vern Raburn said it
will be sometime in the spring before the company can "close the gap between customer aircraft delivery and customer pilot training." For those who don't want to wait,
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| Another Reason to Look at the Grob spn | back to top | |
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Rough Field Capability Attracts Grob Customers
"Since PlaneSense share owners have grown accustomed to the time savings realized by operations into smaller general aviation airports, we needed an aircraft that would be the 'PC-12 of the jets,'" Antoniadis said. The carbon-fiber Grob offers 3,000-foot balanced field performance and it's comfortable on the grass but that doesn't mean it's unsophisticated. It's the launch customer for Honeywell's new Primus Apex glass avionics suite, features a Porsche-designed cockpit and will cruise at 41,000 feet at 415 knots with a range of 1,800 nm. |
There aren't many bizjets with short, unimproved field capability, and that's what attracted PlaneSense to the Grob spn. The fractional arm of New Hampshire-based Alpha Aviation has ordered 25 Grob
spn business jets and hopes to have the first one by the end of next year. The company was founded in 1996 and found a niche fractional market by offering shares in Pilatus PC-12 turboprop singles,
which can get in and out of a lot places many aircraft can't and pack two tons while doing it. PlaneSense founder George Antoniadis said some customers wanted to go faster but didn't want to give up
the flexibility they enjoyed with the PC-12.
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| Battery Troubles? Share Them with Aviation Consumer | back to top | |
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Did Your Battery Die? Tell Us About It
To take part in our online survey, click here. |
Our sister publication, Aviation Consumer, will soon publish an in-depth report on aircraft batteries. As part of that report, the magazine would like to hear about your experiences with
aircraft batteries -- good, bad or otherwise.
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| Our Best Stories Start with You | back to top | |
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AVweb's Newstips Address ...
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Our best stories start with you. If you've heard something that 130,000 pilots might want to know about, tell us. Submit news
tips via email to | Names Behind the News | back to top | |
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Meet the AVwebBiz TeamAVwebBiz is a weekly summary of the latest business aviation news, articles, products, features, and events featured on AVweb, the internet's aviation magazine and news service.
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