With AIN Media Group's Aviation International News and its predecessor Aviation Convention News celebrating the company's 50th year of continuous publication this year, AIN’s editorial staff is going back through the archives each month to bring readers some interesting events that were covered over the past half-century.
REWIND (July 1984): Piper has begun a mammoth packing job at its two Pennsylvania plants following the announcement by company president Max Bleck that all aircraft production activities will be transferred to its facilities in Vero Beach and Lakeland, Florida, beginning in August and to be completed by year’s end.
The consolidation affects a total Piper workforce of 850 in Pennsylvania. In Lock Haven, the company’s legendary headquarters where the aircraft manufacturer currently builds its Mojave, T-1040 Commuter, and Cheyenne IA and IIXL models, 650 workers will feel the impact of the move. Another 200 employees at its Quehanna metals fabrication plant will also be affected.
“This has been a very difficult decision; one made with deep regret,” said Robert Campion, chairman and president of Lear Siegler, the company that recently acquired Piper Aircraft. “In the final analysis, Piper’s losses for the past two years and the low level of general aviation sales really made the decision for us. We just could not continue to operate with so much unused capacity in our plants.”
FAST FORWARD: One of the “big three” from aviation’s golden age along with Beech and Cessna, Piper Aircraft, which celebrates its 85th anniversary this year, had called Lock Haven home for nearly a half-century before it ended its operations there and moved everything to the Sunshine State, where it had had a presence since 1957. After its migration, the airframer has continued its line of light aircraft, anchored by its flagship M600 single engine turboprop. In 2020 the company received FAA type-certification for its HALO safety system, making the M600/SLS the world’s first Garmin Autoland-Âequipped aircraft to be certified.
