“To Conquer the Air: The Wright Brothers and The Great Race for Flight” by James Tobin. Tobin, who holds a Ph.D. in history, is a writer whose work has twice been nominated for the Pulitzer Prize in journalism. He traces the work of the Wrights and interweaves it with the efforts of others who were […]
Flying High (Book Review)
Can a hyperactive, teetotalling, non-flying entrepreneur, whose first business went bankrupt and who was fired by a top company, do anything significant in the airline business? If your name is David Neeleman, the answer is a high-flying “yes,” as told in the new book “Flying High, How JetBlue Founder and CEO David Neeleman Beats the […]
Eclipse flies United
Eclipse Aviation has formed a strategic relationship with United Airlines to provide training. The idea is to provide “a level of professional training normally available only to airline pilots,” according to Eclipse CEO Vern Raburn. Originally, Eclipse had intended to develop its own training program, but concluded that United could “translate airline style training into […]
New museum set to open at Illinois’ Clow International Airport
A new museum will open its doors early next year at Clow International Airport (1C5) in Bolingbrook, Ill. Dubbed The Illinois Aviation Museum, the facility is being created by volunteers and a lot of community support, including the donation of a 6,000-square-foot hangar and $158,000 for interior remodeling, said Kent Demuth, the museum’s executive director. […]
What’s up with Taylorcraft?
It has been more than two years since Harry Ingram bought the assets of the Taylorcraft Aviation Co. and set up a factory in LaGrange, Texas, with intentions of producing the tried and true F-22 design. When General Aviation News interviewed Ingram in May 2003, he predicted the first aircraft would be delivered by Aug. […]
Can planes and parks share space?
Do you know someplace where an airport and a public park peacefully coexist? The Friends of Meigs Field would like you to share that information with the Chicago Park District. The Friends of Meigs are smarting from an article that recently appeared in the Chicago Tribune in which Arnold Randall, the department’s director of planning […]
NASCAR puts brakes on new track
Pilots at Arlington Municipal Airport (AWO) in Arlington, Wash., no longer have to worry about a NASCAR track being built near the field. On Nov. 22 International Speedway Corp. and the politicians of Snohomish County put the brakes on negotiations. The ISC wanted the community to put up $250 million for construction of the track. […]
Forget shopping
The closest most people get to a P-51 Mustang is looking at a picture. Unless, of course, you get your hands on an “aircraft” that’s a computer simulation of the ones flown by the Tuskegee Airmen, the first black pilots in the American military. The simulator is part of the A.C.E.S. Flight Simulation attraction at […]
Minnesota pilots upset over plans to close Crystal Airport
What is the best utilization of land? If an airport is operating in the red, should it close? How many operations are “enough” to justify keeping an airport open? These are the questions swirling around Crystal Airport (MIC) in Minneapolis-St. Paul in the wake of plans to redevelop the land. In late October, the Northwest […]