Remote tower technology is reaching maturity and going operational in Europe, Asia, and Canada. But in the U.S., one of two such projects is being shut down by the FAA and the other has received a stop-work order.
European suppliers and one in Canada have dozens of remote and digital tower projects under development or in operation at airports of various sizes in Europe and Asia. Even projects at large airports are moving ahead, including experimentation at London Heathrow (EGLL) in shadow mode with nearly 475,000 movements per year.
The Bombardier Challenger 3500 is first in class for one reason: its cabin. The 3500’s dimensions place it in the super-midsize category, but is more like a large large-cabin in feel, features, and attention to detail.
Differences of a few hundred miles of range, a few knots of speed, or a few gallons of fuel burn per hour can pale in importance alongside passenger comfort and satisfaction. That’s why manufacturers conduct extensive human-factors studies and focus groups to design customer dissatisfaction out of the cabin. Some do this better than others, and Bombardier has had the secret sauce when it comes to super-midsize business jets.
For U.S. airplane owners and operators the simple four-letter acronym RVSM (for reduced vertical separation minimums, the process for reducing to 1,000 feet the separation between airplanes flying above 29,000 feet) signals the beginning of an onerous process to get formal permission from the FAA to fly in what has become an ordinary fashion.
Operators complain about lengthy approval times for the required RVSM letter of authorization (LOA), FAA Flight Standards District Office (FSDO) inspectors who push RVSM manual approvals to the bottom of their large work piles and a lack of understanding even within the FAA about which entity—the owner or operator—is required to obtain the LOA.
The flight tests are complete, the paperwork submitted, and certification of the Falcon 6X, Dassault Aviation’s flagship-in-waiting, is expected “in the coming weeks,” CEO Éric Trappier said during EBACE. But the twinjet's journey to service entry began well before its first test flight in February 2021, as Philippe Duchateau, chief test pilot on the program, explained aboard the outfitted 6X on the EBACE static display in Geneva.
The test program begins “in the development phase, with a lot of work on the ground before even getting to the flight line,” said Duchateau. Flight-test pilots first meet with engineers to “discuss what the aircraft should be like” in terms of flight control response, handling, and cockpit ergonomics. Engineers then create a basic simulator to mimic the desired characteristics and “we go and test it” to refine the controls, said Duchateau, a former French Air Force test pilot.
Gulfstream’s G700 flight-test program is finally winding down and the compnany recently completed a world tour using the first two production aircraft, dubbed P1 and P2. The production twinjets, which each have a 7,500-nm range, are equipped with a full interior used to test maturity, durability, and comfort of the cabin elements.
Tray Crow, Gulfstream’s director of interior design, explains what’s different between P1 and P2.
Hydrogen may be the fuel of the future, but some maintain it’s probably best used to create sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) rather than a direct fuel source for hydrogen-powered aircraft that do not yet exist. At least that’s what Rolls-Royce senior v-p of strategy Frank Moesta said during an EBACE panel session last month.
“To be honest, I’m not a big fan of thinking about burning hydrogen in an aircraft,” Moesta declared. He would prefer to see hydrogen being used to create eFuels—a synthetic form of SAF—rather than develop aircraft with entirely different propulsion systems.
For decades, loss of control inflight (LOC-I) events have killed more people than any other type of aircraft accident. There are several sobering facts about LOC-I; the threat persists on any flight, at any time, and pilots can have only a few seconds to initiate the proper flight control inputs to safely recover from an aircraft upset.
Many inflight upset events—including those with a perfectly good aircraft—when mismanaged, can quickly escalate into a LOC-I event where the pilot is unable to recover from an unintended extreme deviation from the intended flightpath due to either a lack of skill, altitude, or time, leading to a serious incident or fatal crash. Reliable LOC-I intervention requires early recognition and upset prevention, combined with specialized training to address skill deficiencies for recovery.
European startup Destinus has achieved a first flight using its hydrogen afterburner technology—a key step in its long-term plan to develop a hypersonic airliner that will be able to carry 200 passengers from Europe to Australia in just four hours. The company says using green hydrogen to replace fossil fuel is critical to achieving Mach 5 commercial flights that are environmentally acceptable and more affordable than the Concorde.
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