All articles by David Learmount – Page 5
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Analysis
ANALYSIS: Business aviation works to develop smart approaches
NetJets Europe is leading a consortium of 15 companies to improve access in all weather conditions for business aviation to all kinds of airports, from frantically busy hubs to quietly rural aerodromes.
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Analysis
ANALYSIS: Business aviation safety performance in 2014
In 2014 business jet aircraft suffered the worst global fatal accident rate in recent years, while the worldwide figures for business turboprops improved in comparison to 2013 and 2012.
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Interview
INTERVIEW: Ryanair chief executive Michael O'Leary
Ryanair expects to carry 100 million passengers in its current financial year, and the 30-year-old Irish budget carrier seems infused with a new-found respect for its passengers. Or, as chief executive Michael O'Leary puts it: "We've moved from being cheap and nasty to cheap and cheerful."
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News
Norway prepares report on new airline business practices
Norway's Ministry of Transport and Communications is preparing a report on the effects of commercial air transport globalisation and the "fragmentation" of airline structures within the European economic area and globally. This will include a study of "atypical employment practices" within the industry, according to State Secretary for Transport and ...
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AnalysisANALYSIS: France's ISAE studies reasons for pilot error
Pilots make mistakes. Mistakes are a product of the brain. If it were possible to identify the common neurological precursors for pilot errors, it might be possible to prevent them.
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NewsEASA simplifies PBN preparations
European operators can expect a less bureaucratic transition to performance-based navigation (PBN) procedures because EASA is simplifying the preparation and approval process.
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News
EASA ponders commercial single-engine IMC ruling
EASA has recently completed its review of industry comments on the controversial subject of commercial single-engine turbine operations in instrument meteorological conditions (CAT SET-IMC), and expects to publish its Final Opinion “in the third quarter” of this year for rulemaking by the European Commission in 2016.
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AnalysisANALYSIS: Germanwings crash accident investigation
Airline pilot organisations have expressed their shock at the Germanwings Airbus A320 crash on 24 March – but also their distress that international standards for investigation and the release of information are not being followed.
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AnalysisANALYSIS: Air France, Malaysia Airlines losses prompt rethink on flight data
Calgary-based communications specialist Flyht did not need events like the loss of Air France flight 447 or Malaysia Airlines MH370 to persuade it that airlines’ connectivity with their aircraft could beneficially be improved. It had been producing intelligent on-board satellite communications systems since 2003, and if either or both those ...
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NewsBackground to Germanwings A320 accident
There are few facts available about the 24 March Germanwings Airbus A320 crash in the French Alps, but it is an unusual event in that whatever precipitated the accident appears to have occurred in the cruise. In this case the cruise was a very brief period – less than 3min ...
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News
Europe launches latest SESAR plans
Launching the latest phase of the Single European Sky air traffic management (ATM) operational concept, Eurocontrol says the plan is, by 2019, to deliver an intelligent, networked system capable of optimising individual flight efficiency while maximising traffic flow through finite airspace and airports. Known as Reference Period 2 (RP2) of ...
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News
EASA awards contract for cabin air contamination research
EASA has commissioned a pair of German organisations – one a medical school and the other an applied research establishment – to research cabin air quality. The agency says the research will start with in-flight work to identify suitable instrumentation to measure cabin and cockpit air contamination.
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News
EASA proposes new safety oversight management
Following broad consultation with national aviation authorities, the European Aviation Safety Agency has published proposals for a more flexible and responsive way of managing safety oversight in Europe.
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News
French research project highlights risk of pilot stress
French aerospace engineering school the Institut Superieur de l'Aerospace et de l'Espace in Toulouse is researching pilot physiological and neurological reactions to stress, with the objective of recognising the signals that precede potential error in order to understand and prevent it.
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AnalysisANALYSIS: That pilot shortage – will it prove to be another mirage?
Aircraft order backlog figures show airlines are investing in unprecedented numbers of new aircraft, but not in the skilled trades that are still needed to maintain and fly them. As a result the global ab-initio training industry may have insufficient capacity to cope with demand when the existing rather shallow ...
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Analysis
ANALYSIS: Mystery intact as MH370 report attempts no conclusions
A Malaysia-led multinational investigation team has published what facts it knows about Malaysia Airlines flight MH370, the scheduled Kuala Lumpur-Beijing flight that disappeared without trace on 8 March 2014.
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AnalysisANALYSIS: The state of the search for MH370 on the anniversary of its loss
The first anniversary of the disappearance of Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 will be marked on 8 March 2015. Although the Australian Transport Safety Bureau continues to lead the multinational team searching the southern Indian Ocean seabed, no trace of the missing Boeing 777 has been found.
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NewsMany pilots 'medically-impaired' due to toxic cabin air
The Global Cabin Air Quality Executive heard at its annual conference in London yesterday that at least 3% of airline pilots are flying with degraded physical and mental performance caused by repeated exposure to neurotoxins in the aircraft cabin air, and may become actually incapacitated during flight if their exposure ...
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NewsBA and CAA ordered to act on cabin air contamination
British Airways and the UK Civil Aviation Authority have been given 56 days (until 13 April) to reply to a Coroner’s “Report to Prevent Future Deaths”, that the December 2012 death of a BA pilot, Richard Westgate, was associated with the presence in his body of organophosphate toxins that are ...
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AnalysisANALYSIS: The aftermath of TransAsia flight GE235
Since the 4 February fatal crash in Taipei of a TransAsia Airways ATR72-600, 49 pilots in the carrier’s ATR fleet have taken part in an examination of cockpit emergency drills, at the orders of Taiwan’s civil aviation authority.