50 SKY SHADES - World aviation news

United States aviation news

Danger in the cockpit: FAA records show pilots fly drunk, engage in criminal activity

An American Airlines pilot flunked two sobriety tests before a 7 a.m. flight out of Detroit. An Alaska Airlines pilot flew a commercial plane from California to Oregon and back again, all while allegedly drunk. Yet another pilot, from United, allegedly moonlighted as a pimp, running half a dozen brothels out of apartments in Houston, according to authorities. The cases are enough to frighten th...

Boeing Wins $851 Million Single-Aisle Jets Order From Xiamen Air

Xiamen Airlines Co., a unit of China Southern Airlines Co., ordered 10 single-aisle jets worth about $851 million from Boeing Co. as the carrier expands to meet demand. The company, based in the southern Fujian province, will buy 10 737-800 models valued at July 2014 prices, the parent said in a Shanghai exchange statement Tuesday. The prices are before discounts that are typical in the industr...

Textron Aviation records modest rise in first quarter profits and deliveries

Textron Aviation recorded a modest increase in business aircraft deliveries for the first quarter of 2016 on the back of rising output for the Citation Latitude. For the period ended 31 March, the Cessna and Beechcraft owner delivered 34 business jets and 26 King Air turboprops, up from respective totals of 33 and 25, for the same period in 2015. Speaking on a first-quarter earnings call on...

Bell Helicopter makes 60 further redundancies at Mirabel plant

Bell Helicopter is to axe up to 60 jobs at its manufacturing facility in Mirabel in Canada. The latest cuts are in addition to the 200 layoffs that were announced by the company in February. This latest round of cuts will mean that just under a thousand people will now be based at the plant, down from almost 2,000 employees just five years ago. Lucie Tessier, head of communications at Bell t...

Airbus delivers first aircraft from Alabama plant

Airbus officials say the company has delivered its first aircraft to be produced in the United States. Officials say employees at the company's manufacturing plant in Mobile, Alabama, presented the Airbus A321 to JetBlue on Monday. CEO John Leahy said in a statement that delivering the first aircraft after breaking ground on the facility three years ago is an amazing accomplishment and a...

Solar plane reaches California after flight across Pacific

 A solar-powered airplane on a journey around the world was preparing to land in California on Saturday night to complete a risky, three-day flight across the Pacific Ocean. The Solar Impulse 2 was flying in a holding pattern off the San Francisco coast on 70 percent of stored energy while waiting for winds to decrease for landing at Moffett Airfield in Mountain View. The aircraft perfo...

Air Force One: A trip with special M&Ms and James Bond

It has three floors, a gym and there is always a doctor on board. But getting a ride on Air Force One can be tricky. Only 13 journalists are allowed to travel with the president when he flies, and this week the BBC's Jon Sopel managed to bag a seat on the plane. As the BBC's North America editor, I travel all the time. From one regional airport to another on American airlines where the...

New York-bound flight diverted to Ireland after declaring emergency

A flight to New York has been diverted to Ireland after declaring an emergency minutes after it took off from Manchester Airport. The plane was diverted to Shannon Airport in County Clare amid reports of smoke in a lavatory, according to tracking website Air Live. Pakistan International Airlines Flight 711 was due to fly to John F Kennedy International Airport after its departure schedu...

FAA orders 'urgent' engine fixes for Boeing 787 Dreamliners

Describing it as an "urgent safety issue," the Federal Aviation Administration has ordered modifications on specific General Electric engines on some 787 Dreamliners because an icing problem could force those engines to shut down in flight. Friday's FAA airworthiness directive stems from a January 29 incident aboard a 787 flying at about 20,000 feet. "Ice shed from the fan...

CHC sets hard deadline

CHC Group, one of the world’s two largest helicopter operators, this week announced that it had decided not to make an interest payment on its bonds that mature in October 2020. It was due to pay $46 million on Monday. Although investors in the 9.25% senior secured notes are not happy, the company has a 30-day grace period before it is technically in default on these bonds. CHC could...

Trump Can't Fly His Private Jet Anymore Because He Didn't Pay the $5 Registration

For the past few months, Donald Trump has been too busy presenting insane plans about funding his wall and confusing 9/11 with 7-Eleven to fork over the measly $5 necessary to register his private plane, and now the Trump jet is grounded, the New York Times reports. Earlier in April, the Times reported the plane had been making the rounds with an expired registration since February 1. Because o...

Bell V-280 taking form in Amarillo

Bell Helicopter’s third-generation tiltrotor, the V-280 Valor, is literally coming together in Amarillo, Texas, as the company enters the final stages of mating the wing with the fuselage. It’s a moment of truth for the engineers and fabricators who have been working on prototype aircraft, which is being prepared to fly in September 2017 as part of the US Army’s Joint-Mul...