G650 Deliveries Still Planned for 2011 Despite Crash
After getting peppered with questions from investor analysts yesterday about how the http://www.ainonline.com/news/single-news-page/article/gulfst

After getting peppered with questions from investor analysts yesterday about how the April 2 crash of a flight-test G650 would affect the aircraft program, Jay Johnson, chairman and CEO of Gulfstream parent General Dynamics, finally relented. ā€œI’m not going to go into much more than I’ve already said about the 650, except to reiterate that at this point, I said we would deliver approximately 12 green 650s this year, and I’m still in a place in the year where I believe we can do that.ā€ In his earlier prepared remarks during the first-quarter investor call, he echoed previous company statements about the crash, namely that the accident took the lives of four ā€œdedicatedā€ Gulfstream employees; that the NTSB is in charge of the investigation, thereby limiting what he could say; and that G650 flight testing has been suspended temporarily, though the company is ā€œmoving forwardā€ with all non-flying certification work and consulting with the FAA and NTSB on when flight testing can resume. But after stating that G650 deliveries are still on track for 2011 during the Q&A session, he added: ā€œObviously, the type certification and the FAA restart with the NTSB authorization is elemental to that. But at this point, I’m quite comfortable suggesting that we can carry out the plan.ā€