The chief of the NTSB’s French counterpart is concerned that an increasing number of aircraft are flying under flags of convenience.
Accidents, Safety, Security and Training
News about significant aircraft accidents and information from accident reports; information on safety procedures and concerns; crew, passenger, aircraft and airport security issues; and news about simulators and training procedures.
October 18, 2006 - 5:51am
Apparently, it’s just a time-honored myth that the Inuit language of native Alaskans has as many as 400 different words covering all forms of frozen precipitation. In fact, there are about a dozen, just like in English.
October 17, 2006 - 11:24am
About a year ago, ARG/US took the wraps off its plans for developing a “virtual copilot.” Dubbed SPX, the program is intended, in the words of ARG/US executive v-p and system architect Mark Fischer, to “put another brain in the cockpit” of single-pilot aircraft, initially very light jets (VLJs) but eventually for wider application.
October 17, 2006 - 11:05am
Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University is scheduled to begin graduate and undergraduate degree classes in professional aeronautics and technical management. The courses will be held at the Evergreen Aviation Museum and the Capt. Michael King Smith Educational Institute in McMinnville, Ore.
October 17, 2006 - 10:40am
The number of fatalities in turbine business airplane accidents increased nearly 80 percent (mostly due to crashes involving turboprops) in the first nine months of this year, compared with the same period last year, according to statistics compiled by safety analyst Robert E. Breiling Associates of Boca Raton, Fla.
October 17, 2006 - 10:31am
A homeland security spending bill includes language directing the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) to work with industry to expand the transportation security administration access certificate (TSAAC), a voluntary general aviation security program. The bill instructs the agency to report to Congress in January on plans to enhance TSAAC.
October 17, 2006 - 10:30am
A single report of a miswired APU fire-extinguishing bottle on a Citation X (C750) has prompted a proposed AD to require placing identification sleeves on the positive and negative terminals of APU and main engine fire-extinguishing bottle wiring and reconnecting the wires to the correct terminal studs on Citation 500s, 550s, S550s, 560s, 560XLs and 750s.
October 17, 2006 - 10:05am
The pilot, the sole person aboard, was killed October 9 in the crash of a Tri-state Emergency Systems Agusta A109 (N7YL) about five miles from the airport moments after it was cleared for the ILS approach to Bradford Regional Airport in Pennsylvania. Reported weather was visibility four miles in fog, broken clouds at 800 feet and overcast at 1,100 feet. This is the second fatal crash of an A109 in the U.S. in 10 days.
October 17, 2006 - 10:02am
AirCare’s Facts program now offers hypoxia training at customers’ facilities. Instead of an altitude chamber, the Olympia, Wash. cabin safety and service training company uses a “reduced oxygen breathing device” to change the composition of the gas mixture inhaled to simulate altitudes up to 30,000 feet.
October 17, 2006 - 7:59am
A University of North Dakota (UND) Cessna Citation II icing research aircraft made a successful deadstick landing near Beaver, Alaska, about 70 miles north of Fairbanks, after both engines lost power on September 30. In IMC at 9,200 feet, the Citation accumulated about seven-eighths of an inch of ice on the wing’s leading edge.
