Making its debut at EAA AirVenture 2015 is a new aircraft that’s destined to shatter records. The Airbus Perlan Mission II will use a little-known meteorological phenomenon called the Stratospheric Polar Night Jet, to reach and fly at 90,000 feet – piloted, winged and sustained flight at over 27,400m. Perlan 2 will fly higher than the Lockheed U-2 or SR-71, but it is not an exotically-shaped or scramjet-powered superplane. It is a glider.
Brien Wygle could easily be included in a conversation about celebrated Canadian test pilots, such as de Havilland Canada’s Russ Bannock, Avro’s Mike Cooper-Slipper, and Canadair’s Al Lilly. But Wygle isn’t well known to Canadian aviation historians, thanks to a twist of fate that led him across the border to a long and distinguished career with Boeing.
In 2014, Boeing delivered a record 723 jetliners to airline customers. Airbus wasn’t too far behind, with 629 deliveries. But those numbers are nothing, compared to the 983,533 aircraft delivered by Herpa Wings, a company based in the small German village of Dietenhofen. Each aircraft conveniently comes in a box. And is about 6 inches long. Herpa Wings has been making highly-detailed, scale aircraft models since the early 1990s, in both die-cast metal, and plastic.
It’s been 44 years since the first 747-100 was delivered to Air Canada, in February 1971. That was barely a year after the industry-changing wide-body aircraft entered service with launch airline Pan American Airways, and just two years after the 747’s first flight. In Canada, different versions of the 747 transported passengers on Air Canada, CP Air/Canadian Airlines, Nationair, and Wardair for over 30 years.
"How did Nolinor get its name? Everybody asks that,” laughed Dave Morgan, Nolinor Aviation’s director of sales and marketing. “It was in the early days of the company, and the partners decided to combine the French word ‘nolise,’ which means ‘to charter,’ with the word ‘north.’ They couldn’t decide whether to use the French ‘nord’ or the English word, so they compromised and chopped some letters. So, we’re Nolinor,” explained Morgan.
Pilots flying the upcoming Gulfstream G500 and G600 business jets will control their planes with an advanced version of the ubiquitous side-stick. In the first civil-aircraft installation of the technology, BAE Systems’ “Active Inceptor System,” not only provides pilots with tactile feedback, but the pilot’s and co-pilot’s sticks will be electronically coupled. The stick movements made by one pilot, or the autopilot, will be seen and felt by the other.
The very first Boeing 747 took to the air February 9, 1969, barely four months after the airplane rolled out of its then new factory in Everett, Washington. The prototype, “Queen of the Skies,” was known by her serial number RA001. She was soon joined by additional test aircraft, all working towards the airplane’s entry-into-service in January 1970 with Pan American World Airways. Since then, over 1,500 747s have been delivered.
A new startup company, JetSmarter, hopes to bring a disruptive process to the method of organizing a corporate aircraft charter that has traditionally used paper booking, middlemen and agents. Sergey Petrossov, JetSmarter’s 26-year-old founder and CEO, has created a mobile app that provides the availability and details of more than 3,000 corporate aircraft, tied to a client’s specific needs through the company’s unique software.
Gogo 2Ku Antenna. Photo: Gogo
Written for the Airline Passenger Experience Association
APEX Experience Magazine – December 2014/January 2015
The concept for our world-wide geostationary satellite system was first popularized by the late Sir Arthur C. Clarke in 1945. Clarke, the legendary […]
We’re at Minden-Tahoe Airport in Soaring NV’s LS4 glider, hooked up to the Piper Pawnee towplane, and just starting our takeoff roll. Spencer, our ground crew, runs alongside the glider for a few feet while holding the wingtip. The ailerons are alive in a couple of seconds, and I hold the wings level with the stick, while steering along the runway centerline with the rudder pedals.
