AVmail: February 9, 2009

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Each week, we run a sampling of the letters received to our editorial inbox here in AVmail. One letter that’s particularly relevant, informative, or otherwise compelling will headline this section as our "Letter of the Week," and we’ll send the author an official AVweb baseball cap as a "thank you" for interacting with us (and the rest of our readership). Send us your comments and questions using this form. Please include your mailing address in your e-mail (just in case your letter is our "Letter of the Week"); by the same token, please let us know if your message is not intended for publication.

Letter of the Week: "Most Efficient"?

Regarding the article about Liberty claiming to be the most efficient IFR aircraft:

My 1977 Mooney 201 flew from LAX to Spearfish, SD (SPF) non-stop. That is 1100 miles, and I burned 49 gallons. The flight took six hours and 20 minutes. That is 22.45 miles per gallon. I wasn’t moping along at 106 knots, either. With my two 430s and a Sandel Flight Director, I don’t know how you could have a more efficient IFR airplane.

Thank you,

Guy A. Edwards


High-Flying Obama

Why does President Barack Obama consider bizjets inappropriate for the automakers? Simple. They are begging for billions of dollars of someone else’s money just to survive.

Why did Obama use business jets during the campaign? Simple again. Because it was his money, not ours.

When business gets its act together and becomes profitable, it can spend its own money. I’m sure that then bizjets will again be the transportation of choice.

Richard Steinbrecher


It’s All Business

Regarding Gary Justus’s letter about misuse of corporate aircraft, as evidenced by the number found at sporting-event and vacation locations, he has a very narrow view of what constitutes the conduct of business.

To further a business enterprise, a company must establish and cultivate relations with its customers and reward its more valuable employees. It is very common for companies to have executive boxes at sports stadiums, race tracks, etc. and then to transport customers or top sales people to these events. Some companies allow chief executives to hire, for a price, the company plane for personal use.

Bill Randall

I fly a corporate jet for a privately held company that has worked hard over the course of 50 years. They began with a Navajo, moved up to a King Air and then to a jet. The owner of the company now uses it to fly between his homes, which are used for business meetings, and other business locations as we are not located conveniently to commercial air transportation.

What is wrong with taking some employees or other clients to a vacation spot for a meeting? It seems to me that every large company has been doing this for a long time. Most business meeting are held at large convention centers in Las Vegas or other locations that are not necessarily in the snow belt. They are in Hawaii or some other tropical location.

If the press doesn’t stop painting this picture, we will all be done flying. If this should apply to airplanes, let’s have it apply to cars and homes (among other things), too!

Mike Massell

There’s business aviation, and then there’s business aviation. When a $50 million jet is used to perform a mission easily handled by a Cessna Mustang, a King Air, a Seneca, or even a Saratoga, I think it’s just plain wrong.

Of course, this much hair-splitting never makes it into the public dialog. And that’s a shame.

John Schubert


Emirates A380s

I thought I would provide the correct information regarding Emirates’ A380 fleet. Emirates is presently operating four A380s and is expecting five to six more in 2009. They have at total of 58 on order, with 54 remaining to be delivered.

Karl Johanson

AVweb Replies:

Thanks, Karl. Our figure of 23 A380s flying for Emirates was in error.

Russ Niles
Editor-in-Chief

Media Frenzy

Thank you, Hawker Beechcraft, Cessna and Boeing, for adding to the economic panic mode this country is in by announcing all these layoffs. What possible good does your (and other corporations’) announcements of layoffs provide? Oh, and thank you, AVweb and the rest of the media, for engaging in the feeding frenzy and helping all these corporations add to the panic.

John L. Bradberry

Landing Light Comparison Video

Thanks for the test, but you forgot to mention the power each system requires. I would guess that the LEDs would draw much less than the others.

Neil Angus

AVweb Replies:

For more detail on this, see the full article in Aviation Consumer. Power consumption of the LEDs is around two amps; HIDs, around three; and incandescents, around eight to 10 amps.

Russ Niles
Editor-in-Chief


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