Not content with being part of what is widely considered a “miracle of the modern age”, some of the passengers of US Airways Flight 1549—all of who survived—are already talking about legal action and “compensation” for (as yet undefined) trauma and suffering. In the “wake” of the crash, US Airways was quick to compensate all the aircraft’s passengers for lost luggage ...

The Malaysian Maritime Enforcement Agency (MMEA) has received the first of two Bombardier 415MP amphibious aircraft, which it ordered from Bombardier in June 2008. With the delivery of this first aircraft, Malaysia becomes the launch customer for the 415MP version of the aircraft, and the first Southeast Asian country to use amphibious aircraft for maritime enforcement (further north, Japan has long ...

America’s National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) has issued a Safety Alert in relation to the operation of pneumatic de-icing boots on aircraft. Historically, pilots have been taught to delay activating de-icing boots until such time as a reasonable layer of ice has accumulated, in order to avoid the (theoretical) condition of “ice bridging”. The theory behind “ice bridging” is that premature activation ...

On the 13th of January, Australia’s legendary pioneer aviator Nancy-Bird Walton died at the age of 93. She was widely acknowledged to have “paved the way into the sky” for innumerable Australian women. After beginning flying lessons in 1933 (at the age of 18) and becoming the youngest woman in Australia to achieve a pilot’s licence, Nancy-Bird Walton achieved her commercial ...

On the 30th of December last year, Air New Zealand undertook the world’s first commercial aviation test flight powered by a sustainable second-generation biofuel. The airline used one of its Boeing 747-400s with one of its Rolls-Royce RB211 engines running on a blend of 50:50 jatropha-based biofuel and Jet A1. The flight, which lasted approximately two hours, took off at ...

By Helen Osmaston. One of the most interesting and undeniably critical challenges facing the aviation industry in the face of today’s economic and environmental concerns is the question of how our aircraft will be fuelled in years to come. These challenges present themselves not only in terms of the development of those alternative technologies, but also in the degree of cooperation ...

Each year, the New Zealand division of the Royal Aeronautical Society presents an annual symposium on subjects of interest to the aviation community in New Zealand and the Pacific region. On Friday the 13th of March, the 2009 symposium will be held at the James Cook Hotel in Wellington, New Zealand. Last year’s symposium, “Sustainable Aviation”, focussed on the impact of climate ...

Alternative Fuels—an Airbus Perspective In December last year, Pacific Wings spoke to Sebastien Remy, the head of Alternative Fuels Research Programmes for Airbus, about Airbus’s views on sustainable alternative fuel for aviation’s future; Helen Osmaston reports. Active Tracking Systems—an Introduction Chris Hinch summarises the operational benefits of modern active tracking systems as tools for both safety and productivity. De-Mystifying GNSS GNSS, WAAS, ABAS, SBAS, GBAS, ...

TracPlus Global has launched a new flight and engine time reporting service, which it will provide to its customers at no additional cost. TracPlus Global CEO Chris Hinch referred to the administrative overhead faced by operators in order to ensure accurate charging for their customers. “Our customers spend a significant amount of time collating flight and engine time records to ...