Daily2018-02-20

LATEST NEWS

Monday, October 21st, 2019

Qantas raises benchmark for ultra-long-haul travel with non-stop flight from New York to Sydney

As part of a research project on the effects of ultra-long-haul travel on passenger and crew, Qantas has set a new milestone in commercial aviation with a successful non-stop flight between New York and Sydney. The flight lasted 19 hours and 16 minutes, covering 16,200 kilometers (10,066 miles) with 50 passengers and crew on board a Boeing 787-9 Dreamliner which arrived in Sydney Sunday morning October 20, (local time).

“This is a really historic moment for Qantas, a really historic moment for Australian aviation and a really historic moment for world aviation,” Qantas Chief Executive Officer Alan Joyce, who took the flight, said after landing. “The flight was very successful from two components - the first one was research,” Qantas Captain Sean Golding said, “and also the feat of distance… …we landed here in Sydney with a comfortable 70 minutes of fuel.” In order to achieve such a feat, in addition to only carrying 50 people, the Dreamliner had no cargo, restricted baggage for passengers, and a maximum fuel load.

In a statement, Qantas confirmed that the aim of the research was to increase health and wellness, minimize jet lag and identify optimum crew rest and work periods. The team of researchers on board monitored, among other things, lighting, activity, sleep and consumption patterns of passengers, and crew melatonin levels. They also tracked the brain wave patterns of pilots, equipped for the flight with brain-monitoring devices.

GA Telesis

StandardAero signs PW100/PT6A/JT15D support agreement with Carolina Aviation Technical Services

StandardAero has signed a Services Agreement with Carolina Aviation Technical Services (C.A.T.S), a Part 145 repair station based at Statesville Regional Airport (SVH) in North Carolina. The Agreement – which extends StandardAero’s long-running relationship with C.A.T.S – covers the provision of maintenance, repair and overhaul (MRO) services for the Pratt & Whitney PT6A and PW100 turboprop engines and the JT15D turbofan.

C.A.T.S is a certified maintenance center for a wide range of aircraft from various manufacturers, including Beechcraft, Cessna and Dornier, and an avionics dealership for Honeywell and FDS. The recently signed services agreement with StandardAero will allow C.A.T.S to ensure that its customers benefit from seamless engine MRO support, minimizing downtime while locking in competitive pricing.

Commenting on the agreement, Peter Sistare, Owner of C.A.T.S, said: “We are pleased to be able to extend our relationship with StandardAero. Most importantly they provide the right services to assist us with our customers in the field.”

Vistara finalizes LEAP-1A engine order

Vistara, a joint venture of Tata Sons and Singapore Airlines, have finalized an engine order for 26 LEAP-1A engines to power 13 new Airbus A320neo aircraft, in addition to the 37 leased aircraft from the A320neo family, ordered in July 2018 and the ten leased aircraft already in service.

Alongside this engine order, Vistara has signed a long-term Rate Per Flight Hour (RPFH) agreement for the maintenance of the 120 LEAP-1A engines that power 60 Airbus A320neo and A321neo aircraft in service or in order. The combination of the RPFH agreement and the engine order is valued at more than US$2.4 billion U.S. at list price.

RPFH agreements are part of CFM’s portfolio of flexible aftermarket support packages. Under the terms of the agreement, CFM Services guarantees maintenance costs for the Vistara’s LEAP-1A engines on a dollar per engine flight hour basis.

The Delhi-based airline took delivery of the first LEAP-1A-powered Airbus A320neo in May 2017 and currently operates ten leased LEAP-1A-powered Airbus A320neo aircraft. As part of the airline’s aggressive expansion plan, Vistara will take delivery by the end of this month of its first LEAP-1A-powered A320neo aircraft out of the latest order.

TP Aerospace

NAC delivers one new Embraer E190 on lease to HOP!

Nordic Aviation Capital (NAC) has delivered one new Embraer E190, MSN 19000770, to HOP! on lease. This is the fifth aircraft to deliver as part of a seven aircraft lease agreement.

HOP! is a subsidiary airline of the Air France Group. The airline operates flights for Air France, in several regions of France and Europe.

Liebherr-Aerospace signs new General Terms of Agreement with SR Technics

Liebherr-Aerospace and SR Technics have renewed their partnership with a five-year global service contract. The partners work hand in hand to support a fleet of more than 500 aircraft operated by airlines around the world, including Airbus A320 Family and A330/A340 Family aircraft as well as Embraer E-Jets.

In the five-year global service agreement, Liebherr-Aerospace and SR Technics will provide services on air management systems and flight control systems to a global fleet of more than 500 aircraft; Liebherr from its facilities in Toulouse (France), Lindenberg (Germany) and its repair station in Singapore.

Werner Aero

Acropolis Aviation appoints new Ground Operations Manager

Acropolis Aviation, the UK VVIP executive charter operator based at Farnborough Airport, has formally welcomed Mark Bird as Ground Operations Manager.

Bird is to oversee the introduction of a next-generation flight planning solution, which comes on line in November. The system is being introduced ahead of the ACJ320neo’s arrival. Following a comprehensive evaluation across various alternative suppliers, Acropolis opted to renew with myairops in a nod to its attractive new features and its ease of use between Acropolis’ UK and US operations.

Bird joins Acropolis from Air Tanker, the PFI initiative formed by Airbus, Babcock, Rolls/Royce, Thales and Cobham, operating 14 Airbus A330-200 Voyager aircraft. At Air Tanker, Mark was based out of Brize Norton as an Operations Duty Manager for five years, managing the worldwide day-to-day operations of both civil and military aircraft and managing multi-role operations, liaising with commercial airlines, representatives of the Government and the Royal Flight.

Comlux Completion reinforces management team

Comlux Completion is reinforcing its management team to further develop innovation and leading-edge technologies within the company. Newcomers include Fernando Mas, Chief Technology Officer and Adam White, Head of Engineering.

Fernando Mas, Ph.D., is appointed to his new position after a strong 30-year experience with Airbus where he held several engineering management positions as Senior Expert in “Virtual Product Engineering” and “Advanced Digital Design and Manufacturing” project in Silicon Valley. He also served several engineering Universities and scientific Committees, as professor and researcher member.

Adam White is joining Comlux after a solid engineering experience with several OEM - Gulfstream, Hawker Beechcraft, Bombardier - and the Completion and MRO industry. For the last 10 years, White led the engineering teams and supported the research initiatives of well-known completion centers, both in Europe and in the USA.

Rusada

iBASEt launches solution for maintenance repair and overhaul execution

iBASEt a provider of manufacturing, MRO, and quality software solutions for complex, highly regulated industries, has launched "iBASEt MRO", its Maintenance, Repair and Overhaul software solution for MRO execution at MRO Europe.

“iBASEt MRO” is designed to enable new levels of visibility, velocity, and reliability for maintenance and repair of highly engineered, products that consists of multiple assemblies and have high value and long lifecycles.

The solution serves complex manufacturing OEMs as well as Aerospace and Defense MRO providers who must support ongoing customer demands, rapid engineering changes, and strict compliance requirements. Built upon iBASEt’s software technologies and leveraging 20 years of MRO Operations execution experience, the out-of-the-box solution is designed to provide fast on-boarding and deployment of cost-effective MRO procedures aimed at simplifying the execution of routine & non-routine maintenance tasks.

"iBASEt MRO" provides operators with a complete history and product genealogy of all critical materials and resources for MRO work plans, along with full traceability of important sustainment operations such as equipment data, serial numbers and inspection results, including those parts supplied by vendors.

iBASEt’s solution for MRO can integrate with ERP, PLM, and other software to form an eco-system of digital continuity across the enterprise. This differs from massive silos of data and disconnected systems that are hard to use, expensive to maintain and complex to deploy.

Fokker

Garuda Indonesia to operate two 737-800 converted freighters from GECAS

Garuda Indonesia and GECAS have entered into a lease agreement for two 737-800 Boeing-converted freighters (BCF). The passenger-converted aircraft are slated to be phased in mid-2020 and will provide additional capacity to Cargo Garuda Indonesia, the Indonesian National carrier’s strategic business unit with three freighters currently in use.

Boeing 737-800 freighters are perfectly suited to short and mid-range routes which form the
basis of Garduda’s scheduled network. From its base Cargo Center at Soekarno–Hatta International Airport near Jakarta, the carrier provides dedicated cargo services for mail and express shipments as well as e-commerce and general cargo shipments, accommodating cross-border online purchases.

Joramco signs new maintenance contracts with MNG Airlines and Ryanair

Joramco, the Amman based MRO and the engineering arm of Dubai Aerospace Enterprise (DAE), have signed a new base maintenance agreement with MNG Airlines, a Turkish cargo airline headquartered in Istanbul, to perform three C checks on two A300 and one A330 aircraft of the carrier’s fleet, these checks are planned to commence between December 2019 and February 2020.

Furthermore, Irish budget airline Ryanair has selected Joramco as its base maintenance providor. Joramco will perform heavy checks on Ryanair's Boeing 737 NG fleet. Ryanair has booked two parallel lines at Joramco's facility for the upcoming winter season, commencing November this year until the end of March 2020.

RoyalAero

DC Aviation performs overhaul of Airbus A320 Family aircraft

During several months of ground time, DC Aviation’s Maintenance Center at Stuttgart Airport has overhauled the VVIP-version of an Airbus A320 Family aircraft, investing over 5,000 hours.

One feature of the comprehensive maintenance and refurbishing work was the modernization of the on-board entertainment system, including the installation of fully HD-capable cabling. Fitting the airplane with HD monitors, a new surround-sound system, and a WLAN with a media server brought the cabin technically up to date. The cabin was completely modernized, which included laying of modern durable non-textile (NTF) flooring.

In addition to the cabin work, a ten-year maintenance check and a landing gear overhaul were performed. The ground time was also used to perform sensible structural repair work.

In the past, DC Aviation has already performed complete cabin overhauls e.g. on the Legacy 650 and the Challenger 850 and has acquired comprehensive experience with changing landing gear. It has been offering line and base maintenance services for various types of aircraft since 1999.

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