General aviation has an image problem.
Ask any random person on the street about the importance of general aviation to the United States and you’ll probably hear “isn’t that only for rich people and their toys?”
“People perceive that only a few people benefit from general aviation,” said Eric Hinson, president and CEO of Simcom International and the chairman of the General Aviation Manufacturers Association (GAMA). “They have an incomplete picture.”
“GA is so much broader than that,” he said during GAMA’s State of the Industry event on Feb. 22, 2023.
Of course, GA moves people from one place to another, whether it’s for business or pleasure.
“But it is so many other things,” he said.
For instance did you know that there are 1,500 GA aircraft in the United States that fly as air ambulances?
Add to that aircraft that fight fires, maintain crops, and conduct humanitarian flights, as well as the large fleet of aircraft that provide cargo and logistics operations all over the world, he said.
And don’t forget flight training, which provides the pilots who fly all those aircraft that are so integral to society.
That’s the message that GA needs to get out to not just the general public, but also decision makers, he said.
To prove the value of general aviation, GAMA officials asked the folks at FlightAware to compile all the ADS-B traffic related to general aviation in the first 10 days of February 2023.
What they found was that there was an average of 45,000 general aviation flights a day. Hinson pointed out that this did not include helicopter flights, so the number is no doubt much larger than this.
Those 45,000 flights go to, on average, 5,000 airports a day.
The airlines only service 400 airports in the United States, so for folks in rural communities, GA is their connection to the world, GAMA officials said.
And that connection is becoming more important as airline service disappears.
Between 2019 and 2022, 324 airports lost airline service, with an average loss of 31% of airline flights, according to Pete Bunce, GAMA president and CEO.
He added that 60 airports lost 50% or more of their airline flights, while 14 airports lost all scheduled airline service.
“GA picks up that slack,” he said.
“GA makes commerce happen,” he continued. “It makes people’s lives better.”
But there’s more.
GA and business aviation also are the technology and safety incubator for all aviation, he said.
Think about it: Product development in aviation often starts at the GA level, from electric aircraft to engine technology, to advances in composites and avionics.
Both Hinson and Bunce noted that the next 20 years will see great advances in new technology for aviation, but there are a few things that have the potential to slow things down.
No. 1: The regulatory authorities.
“It takes over a decade to certify a new engine,” Bunce noted.
Part of the problem is that those regulatory authorities, including the FAA, need to have employees who are trained “and keep pace” with new technology, he said.
The FAA has struggled to provide “timely oversight” to the GA industry, Hinson said, adding this is one of the things GA advocates will bring up during the FAA reauthorization process this year.
“A lot goes in and very little comes out,” he said. “It’s difficult to see where things are getting bogged down.”
He added there has been a “fairly significant exodus of experienced personnel from the FAA,” with some people retired and others hired by the aviation industry.
“It’s a fairly new workforce,” he said.
Bunce added that 10% of the positions in the FAA that work on certification are empty.
“We need to fix the regulatory process, but we can’t do that without the workforce in the FAA,” Hinson said.
Workforce challenges aren’t just at the FAA. General aviation companies, from manufacturers to FBOs to flight schools, are scrambling to find trained workers. Many have created their own pipelines, such as internship programs or agreements with colleges and universities.
And the supply chain challenges that began with the pandemic continue to plague all industries, including general aviation.
But for all the challenges facing it, GA has a bright future, according to the GAMA officials.
Airplane and helicopter deliveries and billings were up in 2022, with that trend expected to continue.
“The average age of the GA fleet is 48 years,” Hinson said. “There is opportunity for growth.”
NOTHING GA currently provides is worth the cost to rural communities. GA facilitates the destruction of wildlife, habitats, farms and livability in rural places, cities aren’t appreciating the oversteps and impact either. Nobody should expect to walk away from their investments and lives else endure aviations growth and neurotoxic exposures and blasting decibels in an otherwise quiet area. These communities which are tortured and homes which are targeted by GA are a large part of funding for local airports. GA’s unapologetic life injuring and life ending exposures and retaliations will only continue to tarnish GA’S image.
When you’d mention regulatory, I’d hoped you’d mention the lack of regulatory practices and enforcement regarding barnstorming and retalitory flight activity if someone complains about it.
The flight schools you speak so highly of should also be teaching their students how to protect nearby communities and why that’s important. They should be teaching of the irreversible harm to children, reduced IQ’s, harmed physical and mental health, correlation to increases in violence, strokes, vascular disease and heart attacks as a direct result of aviations pollutions and decibels. As we have seen in the innovation fight, especially concerning avgas, there is a lack of honesty or acceptance regarding harms and a lack of innovation or community protections as a result. This allows the regulators to abdicate their role in promoting and approving innovation.
The pressure to honor American lives and constitutional protections must come from inside the aviation community. Bad actors cannot disavow ground side citizen democratic protections without dismantling the democratic protections aviation lives under.
When communities and citizens spend their personal resources, life savings and limited time on this planet fighting aviation, hatred runs deep and wide.
Citizens should not have to fight aviation to protect their lives and investments from aviations agenda, aviation greed and aviation entertainment.
If GA is to improve their image, it will take the aviation community making a commitment to a cultural shift away from embracing censorship, away from denying harm to speaking out against those doling out abusive flights and practices.
Yikes, remove the tinfoil hat… SMH
Do you people have jobs or do you spend all your time trolling aviation websites?
Pete Bounce, Saviors of the rural with no scheduled airline service? Nonsense! EAS in Georgia turned into a long running USA Congressional subject of ridicule for its outrageous cost per ton-mile. Technically we have an air-taxi service from Middle Georgia Regional airport, but it’s the equivalent in cost to a professional Cessna Caravan charter by one of the big aircraft chartering companies operating out of Atlanta -Hartsfield or Dekalb- Peachtree . Yes, for a very small percentage of USA citizens with extremely large percentages of discretionary income GA helps fill in the lack of scheduled airline service at particular airports, but mostly it seems to be about wealthy people going to college football games, golf tournaments, and some small package deliveries. for a very small percentage of the business community. It’s probably less expensive to hire a Lyft or Uber from central Georgia to Atlanta than it is to use our supposed air-taxi service. and that’s with the 100% empty vehicle fee to dead head back to Central Georgia from Atlanta.
What irks me is to keep hearing the phrase “General aviation and BUSINESS aviation….”
As if those are two different things.
There are only three types of airplanes in the air.
1 Military
2 Airlines
3 GA.
If you aren’t in group 1 or 2 then you are part of GA.
“Business flights”, ag planes, cops, firefighters etc are ALL part of GA and when you artificially separate or subdivide GA you only weaken the collective power that GA has to protect itself.
Oh, and when you stop killing 40,000 people a year in cars get back to me about the few GA accidents that endanger people on the ground.
OK then. But GA IS divided into two subsets – commercial and recreational/non-commercial. This is all based upon whether the activity involves ‘transfer of funds’ to put it simply. These different categories are highly FAA regulated, both in financial and flight operational specifics. Likewise, trying to explain whether air taxi or charter using less than airliners are “business aviation” or GA is meaningless to all those except actual participants. Arguing semantics seems to offer little to public perception or defining whats-what to the uninformed masses.
It’s simple. The Pogo syndrome. WE HAVE MET THE ENEMY, AND HE IS US.
Right on the money, Earl!
While the article is a well-written promo piece for GA, it misses the mark when it comes to public perception of it. I’ve lived in 7 states around the USA, and from that experience I opine that the major concern of the average American is the rate of crashes taking lives both in the aircraft and on the ground. Little airplanes that crash into houses and school yards and highways, killing occupants and innocents on the ground. Yellow police tape, flashing lights of emergency service vehicles, smoke rising from the wreck and the Bubble-Headed Bleach Blond holding the mic telling us of yet another little plane crash. The scourge of drones buzzing overhead just adds to the annoyance factor of hobby aircraft. The public is getting fed-up with GA.
I am not a pilot, but I have friends who are, and they share my opinion that the idiot factor in the GA hobbyist community is the major cause of GA tragedies. I read this service every day and hang my head in disgust at the accident rate. There are so many GA accidents every week that Juan Williams can’t keep up with them. Get-there-itis; no or skimpy pre-flight checks; water in the fuel; wrong left-right settings on fuel tanks; not checking the weather in advance on the whole flight path; operating engines hundreds of hours beyond maintence time, e.g., dry vacuum pump disassembles; shade tree mechanics not understanding aircraft engines are Rolex watches, not their old 55 Chevy six; CFIs who fail to grab the stick in time to avert tragedies; nose-overs because of cheap lazy engineering in nose wheel assemblies that can’t even take a hard landing. The list goes on and on and on for both pilot error and aircraft designs and manufacturing. All are culpable. All need to be taken to the woodshed for a lot of mid-course correction.
I’m a senior degreed electrical engineer who has designed good and useful consumer, commercial and government pieces of gear and know what microprocessors are capable of. For the Love of God I don’t understand why enabling carburetor de-icing heating isn’t just as automatic as fuel pump action. Where are the retro-fit kits for all the ancient Cesnas and Pipers in the world? And on new models? Death rides the skyways along with the pilots and their unwary passengers because of last-century designs that make the Ford Model-T look like a modern F150.
I have known three– yes three — men who designed and constructed their own flying machines and came down in a bloody pulp of body parts and smoldering aluminum and tree limbs. One used an old Chevy Corvair engine on the basis he believed it was conceived by airplane engine designers therefore it had to be OK for use in the air. Another old neighbor in NJ left wife, kids, grandkids and a dental practice after he became one with a home build death trap and trees. I also knew the first responders who try every day to un-see that wreck. His tubular frame welds came apart during a turn and the whole tangled mess hit the woods.
Lighter regulation? NO! Heavier regulation. The public screamed for lighter regulation of the drug industry in hopes of faster miracle break-through drugs via shorter testing periods, and intentionally harmful drugs hit the market and people died as a result. The same thing and worse can happen with less rather than more FAA enforcement. The FAA does a remarkable job of policing the whole aviation industry and deserves kudos rather than derision for doing their job of Safety First. Some people scoff at vehicle speed limits, seat belts and helmets arguing those things limit their personal freedom. Bravo sierra.
If good and safe regulations frustrate GA hobbyists who champ at the bit to get up in the air for a spin just like jumping into their old pickup to head to the store for a six pack, so what? Precious lives are potentially saved as a result. Recalls the old Peter, Paul and Mary lyrics: “How many deaths does it take ’till he knows, that too many people have died?” Get it together GA hobbyists and manufacturers before the general public closes your grass strips and takes Congressional action to curtail your hobby. You will have richly deserved it.
Regards/J
Actually, my installation of the rotax 912 extends the water jacket used to cool the cylinder heads to include the Bing carbs. Essentially, carb heat is on full-time. There isn’t even a knob in the cockpit. I’ve flown non-jacketed 912s in similar airframes and can’t tell the difference in performance.
Most pilots, in my experience, use carb heat wrong anyway—or at least ineffectually. To get maximum benefit, one should apply carb heat at power, while the engine is hot. Pulling it on during low power directs markedly cooler air into the carb, resulting in taking longer to purge the ice. There is always a chance the ice will get ahead of the somewhat warm engine heat, resulting in a lack of power on a go-around.
Sorry for the loss of your friends but you are sadly misinformed on virtually every subject you spoke of and very incorrect .
You spew a bunch of details through your rose colored glasses with details fed off the media, and your own few close to home encounters. You are GA’s enemy.
I believe somehow your angry about a lot of things. In some respects your right about GA aircraft innovation. I assume auto pilot system could do much more and make navigation simple but then old pilots would say you have to learn everything the old way practice the old way, use the old way to be fully qualified. Imagine getting in a GA telling the GPS where you want to go via VFR or IFR and it would do all the calculations without pressing lots of buttons. Make aircraft easier to fly and safer.
James your comments prove the authors opinion is correct as most of your observations are erroneous ( I.e. she is correct in saying the general public like yourself do not understand general aviation and have the wrong impressions about GA.) You completely missed the point that overburdening regulation on aviation is what has stalled its progress in design. We don’t need more regulation we need better regulation. There is a fix to this being developed in legislation but it’s moving at the typical FAA snails pace. Soon you will see more innovation coming to GA aircraft. The other issues you mention that cause accidents are pilot error. The FAA has an extensive safety program to educate pilots and to their credit aircraft fatalities per year has been on a steady decline for the last 20 years. GA fatalities are down to around 350 per year. Whereas the number of bicyclists killed each year is over 800, Where’s the public outcry to add more regulation to to the cycling industry? All life and every form of transportation has risk. So, James if you accept the risk of going outside lest one of those little planes falls on your head, for the Love of God don’t ride a bicycle, they are dangerous!
James, all these great technological things you think need to be applied to GA raises the cost for everybody involved in it, most of them very little perceived benefit. And yes more than just GA people or pilots will pay for that. Air ambulance services will go up, police, fire, cargo rates, will go up. You also should get a little more involved in research the kit airplane/experimental part of GA. The advances in those over the last 30 years have been fantastic.
Also, I would highly suggest you get your pilot’s license and maybe learn a little bit more of what you’re talking about. such as there’s times when you don’t want carburetor heat applied automatically. GA crashes are more than the airlines, that’s true. Unfortunately there will always be crashes and injuries / death. The news media reports you see on those, are very small compared to all GA accidents / incidents. The risks associated with GA flying are very low and I happily assume those risks. Yes other people on the ground might not assume those risks but it would be no different than them getting injured in a car crash someone else driving or other activities.
The FAA does a very good job enforcing regulations on us pilots when somebody makes a mistake or there’s a complaint. Some would say they get overzealous at times. I believe the fa needs to revisit some of the regulations on certification of aircraft and engines and bring some of those regulations more up to date. The FAA is painfully slow and embracing new technology, just look at how long it took them to get glass panels approved in aircraft. And in case you think the FAA is some great savior for you, let’s not forget about them allowing Boeing to basically self-certify/approve their manufacturing and processes on the 737 Max. We all know how well that turned out.
With some small single engine 4-place a/c costing $400,000+ and an air ambulance ride costing over $10,000, and flight instruction at over $200/hr, it is no stretch of the imagination that ‘small airplanes’ and their ownership and operation are perceived as a privilege of only the rich.
Yes you wonder what the profit margin is in all of these?
Part of the problem is catering to anti-capitalists. Obama launched the anti-GA campaign once he took office. Only Jack Pelton, CEO at Cessna at that time, pushed back, and that cost him his job. All the others caved. “Go woke, go broke”. As far as certification is concerned, one only needs to look at the innovation and growth in homebuilt aircraft to see that when the chains of government oversight (meddling) are removed, innovation flourishes and costs sink. Look at Viking Aircraft Engines for a great example of lower cost engines whose replacement parts can be found in most car parts stores.
You’re entitled to your opinion, but in truth the Obama effort was directed at a user fee to reduce the deficit. No different from a toll road or the Gingrich push to put every agency on a paying footing (he pushed thru outrageous user fees from National Parks entrance to grazing public lands to fees for filing or requesting copies of records).
The philosophy of pay-to-play (or use) is frequently mirrored in every local & state budget. When budgets come out, everybody whines about paying for services they don’t personally use: rec centers, dog parks, bike paths, pools, building permits, etc. So we end up in a swelter of individual use taxes on top of the tax base.
Use tax mania & privatization of aviation services (from tower & route controllers to weather briefings) is why flying in the EU is so expensive. OTOH, a case could be made that GA in the US has a free-rider problem. Afterall, the “bigs” pay landing & use fees at nearly every airport. And they provide far more value, on a per-landing basis, to local economies.
Nothing done by that that person named Obama and his administration was worth of more than a Bravo Sierra.
Huh, what is a bravo sierra? Explain yourself!
What do you think our fuel taxes pay for? By the way GA does have landing and parking fees at a lot of airports in the US. For all the people that complain about GA, I wish I could turn a switch and there would be absolutely no GA support for their communities at all in any shape or form. We’ll see how long that lasts.
We have come along way, but we still have a long way to go, in 1955 while living in Chicago, we took a trip to O’Hare Air Force Base as a freshman in high school. during the rest of my high school career in the first three years of college, I was continually told to forget about flying because I didn’t have 2020 uncorrected vision in my grades were too poor in college. I C averaged. age 28 I took a job at the airport and found these on Troost to be untrue, you don’t have to be perfect from the neck down. I never look back and I’ve been active in the aviation GA, mostly my whole career it was 60 years ago.. right now I’d like to have 20 of those years back to keep on going.
Also, the US Civil Air Patrol flies the largest fleet of GA aircraft on search and rescue activity.
Many law enforcement groups fly GA and light sport aircraft.