Delta Connection regional carrier Atlantic Coast Jet is to open a Fairchild Dornier 328JET maintenance base in Columbia, South Carolina. Guangzhou Aircraft Maintenance Engineering has signed a new contract with China Southwest Airlines to perform a D-check, plus end-of-lease check on a Boeing 737-300. Piedmont Hawthorne Aviation is to open a regional airline heavy maintenance facility alongside its existing plant in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. DaimlerChrysler Aerospace Airbus Aerospace subsidiary Elbe Flugzeugwerke has sealed a deal with a Magellan Aircraft Services and Triton Aviation joint venture leasing company to undertake the freighter conversion of two Airbus A310-300s - the first for the long-range version of the twinjet. The Dresden-based division will begin the work at the end of next month. Mexico's Facts Air has contracted Texas-based Aerosky to complete a freighter conversion of a Boeing 737-200Adv.

Source: Flight International