Embry-Riddle plans NextGen demo

Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University plans a November demonstration of future en route automation modernization (ERAM) and traffic management advisor (TMA) capabilities, according to this AINonline story.

Sour economy not weighing on light jets?

The Palm Beach Daily News has a rather boosterish outlook on the future of light jets, despite the global economic meltdown. While the article acknowledges the travails of the likes of DayJet and Eclipse, it’s overwhelmingly upbeat about the role VLJs will play in years to come. NextGen, of course, is what will make it all happen, according to the reporter.

“The Federal Aviation Administration has begun plans for upgrading the airspace system with new satellite and ground technology called NextGen.
This equipment will allow for much more traffic than is currently handled, yet the bottlenecks will remain at the big airports.
The end result is that small aircraft will flourish.”

More schools to help students land jobs, planes

The FAA’s picked more schools to provide air traffic controller training to undergraduate students. A release from FAA provides the full list. The agency helpfully reminds students it needs to hire more than 17,000 new air traffic controllers over the next decade.

$2.5 billion bid for Chicago’s Midway

A group of investors has bid $2.5 billion to take Chicago’s Midway Airport private. A brief story from The Associated Press is here. The long-term lease on Chicago’s No. 2 airport would net the Windy City $1 billion, AP reports, with much of that going to infrastructure improvements.

Blakey: NextGen a ‘different ballgame’

This story from Forbes is largely about the $488 billion appropriated for the Pentagon for 2009, with the Aerospace Industries Association (AIA) calling it a good start. But it also succinctly rehashes some of the recent kerfuffles in Congress over FAA funding and NextGen. AIA chief executive Marion Blakey calls NextGen a top priority for the FAA. That’s hardly surprising, since NextGen got underway while she headed the FAA. In the article, Blakey responds to some of the frustrations aired by lawmakers last month:

Blakey suggests such frustration stems from the FAA’s poor track record with modernizing radar-based air traffic control. NextGen, she says, is a different ballgame, and she sees the FAA making progress, citing the agency’s recent success with a software update known as En Route Automation Modernization.

“They brought that system in and within the budget constraints,” she says. “That’s huge.”

Raytheon wins DoD, FAA radar contract

Raytheon Co. has won an order from the Department of Defense and FAA worth up to $679 million to install 116 Digital Airport Surveillance radar systems at Air Force and civilian airports around the world, The Associated Press reports. The radar will replace analog systems nearly 30 years old, according to Bloomberg.

Make sure to miss the Strip when landing in Las Vegas

It’s not just high-rollers flying in for the baccarat that crowd the airspace in Las Vegas. Or so says this story, from the Las Vegas Review-Journal by way of The Associated Press.

Cost-benefit of ADS-B ‘non-positive,’ general aviation says

Operators have responded to the proposed ADS-B mandate for general aviation aircraft with a Bronx cheer, AINonline reports.

A cost-benefit case for ADS-B equipage of general aviation aircraft cannot be made, concluded an Aviation Rulemaking Committee (ARC) in a report published last week. Analysis of public comments relating to the FAA’s September 2007 ADS-B NPRM showed 101 positive and 1,271 “non-positive” responses.

Sources tell the Aviation International News website they saw little or no benefit to the plan, when compared with its compliance costs. And without incentives, they add, many operators will stall on buying ADS-B “out” equipment, on the assumption that avionics prices will only come down. Plus, equipment purchased today could well be obsolete by 2020, the proposed compliance date.

As one FAA insider conceded to AIN, “We didn’t anticipate it might be interpreted that way.”

Spotlight on runway excursions

Runway excursions remain a regular and often fatal problem, despite ongoing awareness initiatives, according to this story from Flightglobal.

Speaking at the European Business Aviation Association Conference and Exhibition in Geneva this year, (Flight Safety Foundation) president Bill Voss highlighted runway safety in all its forms as being worthy of particular attention, but excursions in particular. He said: “Data shows runway excursions are the most common type of runway safety accident (96%) and the most common type of fatal runway safety accident (80%).”

And this quotation, from the Flight Safety Foundation‘s Jim Burin, frames the issue very succinctly:

“Not all unstable approaches end up as a runway excursion, but every runway excursion starts as an unstable approach.”

NASA to boost spending on NextGen R&D

Congress has sent President Bush a NASA reauthorization bill that includes more money for NextGen research and development, according to this release from the House.

Specifically, the bill increases aeronautics R&D funding in order to address critical national needs such as the NextGen air traffic control management system.

Computer glitch forces BA to cancel flights

British Airways canceled more than a dozen flights, a day after an air traffic control computer glitch restricted the number of planes able to enter British airspace, according to this brief story from The Associated Press.

ADS-B delivers South Florida pilots traffic and weather

The FAA reports pilots flying in aircraft equipped with ADS-B in South Florida can now receive free traffic and weather information on their cockpit displays. For traffic, it’s the first time pilots can see the same info available to air traffic controllers.
Read more in this FAA press release and in this press release from ITT Corp. ITT last year won the $207 million initial contract to lead the development and deployment of the first phase of the ADS-B ground infrastructure.

It’s not clear how many of those ADS-B-equipped planes are actually flying these days. DayJet Corp., whose fleet of air taxis was to have been a testbed for NextGen technology, including ADS-B, has stopped flying as of Sept. 19. This story from the Birmingham Business Journal has the company blaming its woes on money and aircraft problems. Read more about the original DayJet-FAA MOU in this Google cache of a company press release (pdf) from June 2008.

FAA’s Sturgell on NextGen: “We’re making solid progress”

A dispatch from Oshkosh, courtesy of Aero-News Network, quotes Acting FAA Administrator Robert Sturgell on NextGen:

“I can say that we’re making solid progress. The foundational technologies are either already in place or will be soon enough. They include WAAS, which provides increased airport access in reduced visibility conditions. We’ve published over 1,000 WAAS LPV procedures and we now have more of them than ILS procedures.

“RNP/RNAV are also making a difference. Look at what’s going on at DeKalb Peachtree Airport in Atlanta. The new RNP procedure will support IMC operations to runway 2R to a 340-foot decision height. This mitigates obstacles on the approach path and de-conflicts traffic flows around Peachtree and Hartsfield.”