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Mar 28, 201910 min read

News Letter 28 March 2019

Good day all

With two very exciting weekends behind us seems we in for a pretty quiet one this week, we are not aware of any aviation events planned for this weekend.

The 2019 Edition of the PTAR to be held 3rd & 4th of May 2019 in Saldanha Bay, with only 36 Days to go the debate is heating up around the new race format. Some of the veteran PTAR pilots are not convinced that the new format, which has been proven to be a winner at the various speed rallies held around the country, is going to cut it. Judging from the entries received, which are now close to 50, one can only compliment the SAPFA officials for blowing new life into the sport. After the dismal turnout of last years RTAR this long standing event was in danger of becoming extinct.

Anyone interested in joining the action please register at http://www.sapfa.co.za/index.php/component/competition/?view=pilot

Additional Information

1. Entry Fee R 3 500 per aircraft (R 9 200 with Accommodation at Club Mykonos for 2 for 3 nights) (This amount can be paid into the SAPFA bank account)

2. Membership fees Aero Club & SAPFA R 940 per crew member - to register or renew https://aeroclub.blueboxonline.com

3. FAI license R 210 per crew member (Also can be purchased on line on the Aero Club Bluebox payment system) If neither of the crew are SAPFA members then the total fee per crew is R 5 800. (R 11 500 with accommodation - 2 crew, 3 nights) If preferred, this total amount can be paid to SAPFA, SAPFA will apportion to Aero Club the membership fees.

4. Additional banquet tickets R 350 ea (The two crew members get a banquet ticket each as part of the Entry fee of R 3 500)

5. Accommodation - SAPFA has secured a block booking at Club Mykonos for R 950 pp sharing per night. breakfasts included. You may pay into the SAPFA bank account the accommodation for your requirements. See Item 1, if you take the full entry fee option of R 9200 which includes the aircraft entry and 3 nights’ accommodation for 2)

5.1 - For 2 crew sharing for 3 nights = R 5 700

5.2 - For 2 crew sharing for 4 nights = R 7 800

5.3 - Single - R 1 500 per night

5.4 - 3 Sharing - R 720 pp - 4 Sharing - R 540 pp - Children under 12 - R 70 pp per night

5.5 - Contact Race Secretary Sharon on airshowevents@gmail.com to make your bookings and payments

6. Car Rental - We have secured the services of Bidvest Car Rental Group based in Vredenburg to support the PTAR teams.

6.1 Contact phone No: +2722 719483

email: reservations@bidvestcarrental.co.za

6.2 There will be a pick-up and drop-off fee applicable to Saldanha Airfield which is a discounted rate of R210 one way during office hours and R420 one way during afterhours and weekends. Quote PTAR for these rates to be applicable.

Leonardo AW609 enters mass production

Leonardo is focusing on the first delivery of the AW609 tiltrotor in 2020, as the aircraft enters the mass production phase at Leonardo’s Philadelphia facility. The company said airframe components of the tiltrotor will enter the assembly phase in the coming weeks, ahead of the AW609 receiving Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) civil certification.

“I think the AW609 program has made a lot of progress,” said Gian Piero Cutillo, Leonardo Helicopters’ managing director, at a press conference during HAI Heli-Expo 2019. “We can now see the light at the end of the tunnel. We are now focusing on delivery next year of the first 609.”

The company also signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) at Heli-Expo with Nakanihon Air Service, Co., Ltd. of Japan to study the requirements for introducing the AW609 tiltrotor into service in the country. Leonardo is deploying a global campaign for the world’s first multi-role commercial tiltrotor and will work with Nakanihon Air Service over the next 12 months to identify opportunities for the 609 in Japan.

Leonardo said it is offering the AW609 for a range of roles such as emergency medical services, search-and-rescue, and transport. “Some of the AW609 missions will be offshore-related, but not uniquely related to the oil-and-gas specific operations,” added Roberto Garavaglia, senior vice president of competitive analysis and strategy at Leonardo.

“At Nakanihon Air Service we operate about 80 aircraft, both fixed-wing aircraft and helicopters, and we are very interested in the new tiltrotor category,” the company said in a press release. “Through this joint working group with Leonardo, we would like to explore the applications of the AW609 to future aeromedical services, disaster emergency response and news coverage as well as new areas of business.”

The 609 tiltrotor has a range of 1,242 miles and can fly at an altitude of 25,000 feet. It also features a pressurized cabin for patient comfort during medical treatment in the air.

Leonardo has also started production of the world’s first AW609 tiltrotor Level D full-flight simulator (FFS), which is being developed in collaboration with CAE, Inc. Cutillo added that Leonardo is planning to build an FSS in Philadelphia for the AW169 in early 2020 – which would be the first AW169 FFS in the U.S.

The AW609 and AW169 simulators will be housed at Leonardo’s new 60,000-square-foot Helicopter Training Academy in Philadelphia, which is currently being developed; the new training academy will have maintenance training bays, virtual enhanced training devices, and classrooms in addition to the Level D full-flight simulators.

Cutillo also said the company is continuing development of the Clean Sky 2 NextGen Tiltrotor. “We expect to fly a demonstrator by 2023, in its final configuration we expect to fly it in the 2030-35 period.” The next-gen tiltrotor is larger than the nine-seat AW609, as it will hold 20 passengers.

SKA and aviation sector looking at flight impacts

Officials from the Square Kilometre Array (SKA) radio telescope and the aviation sector are currently engaging to discuss the possible impact of the project’s development on national flights in the area. The SKA project is an international effort to build the world’s largest radio telescope, with plans to eventually have over a square kilometre of collecting area. Because of this, the Department of Science and Technology has introduced a number of regulations to prevent outside interference from impacting its activities.

It was reported this week that one of the possible outcomes could see flights between Johannesburg and Cape Town diverted, leading to longer travel times and increased cost to the customer. However, Dr Adrian Tiplady, head of strategy and business processes at the SKA said that this is not necessarily the case.

Tiplady said that there had been a number of misconceptions during the discussion process which has created a narrative of a ‘black hole in the middle of the Northern Cape’. “This is quite far from the truth,” he said. “The regulations have had a variety of inputs from various stakeholders – including the communications sector and the aviation sector – and officially came into force in December 2018.” “They explicitly exclude the spectrum bands used by the various aeronautical sources.” The rest of the regulations provide for a permit system which tries to create an optimal operating environment, Tiplady said.

The SKA team also recognises that there are some essential services operating in the area (such as the aviation ) and it permits these frequencies in the area. Tiplady said that separate from the regulations, the SKA has been engaging directly with the aviation sector and with both the Department of Transport, and the Department of Science and Technology. “What we had agreed with the aviation sector is to not make the regulations applicable to them, but instead engage directly with them,” he said.

These engagements would try to understand what the impact is and see how best the SKA and the aviation sector could jointly mitigate this impact through a variety of measures, which would ultimately be enforced through the civil aviation authority, he said. While Tiplady noted that he is not an aviation expert, he said that some of the possible measures could include:

Implementing a standard operating procedure within a certain radius of the SKA where power levels are reduced; Implementing a standard operating procedure within a certain radius of the SKA where communications take place before and after entering the space; Possible optimisation of the flight path.

“There are a variety of mitigation measures and we aren’t expecting aviation authorities to start implementing major diversions of flights around the much larger protected area,” he said. “It really is a small area and what we are trying to do now is quantify that impact and put a number on it. “Once this is done, the technical working group can start looking creatively at some of the mitigation measures.”

Tiplady said that this is not as simple as what has been reported on, but that the SKA and aviation sector are both on the same page and are working cooperatively. “Whatever the outcome is, it will be a jointly arrived at instead of something that we develop in isolation and enforce onto the aviation sector,” he said.

Boeing unveils fix to flight system after deadly crashes

Embattled aviation giant Boeing pledged to do all it could to prevent crashes such as the two that killed nearly 350 people in recent months as it unveiled a fix to the flight software of its grounded 737 Max aircraft.

Boeing gathered hundreds of pilots and reporters to unveil the changes to a stall-prevention system, which has been implicated in the crashes in Ethiopia and Indonesia, as part of a charm offensive to restore the company's reputation. "We are going to do everything to make sure that accidents like this don't happen again," Mike Sinnett, Boeing's vice president of product strategy, told reporters at a factory in Washington state.

Meanwhile, in the nation's capital, the head of the United States air safety agency faced harsh questions from senators over its relationship with and oversight of Boeing. Senator Richard Blumenthal said at a Senate subcommittee hearing the Federal Aviation Administration's (FAA) delegating safety work to aviation companies puts "the fox in charge of the henhouse".

"The fact is that the FAA decided to do safety on the cheap, which is neither safe nor cheap," Blumenthal said. He vowed to introduce legislation to change the system. Dan Elwell, the acting head of the FAA, defended his agency but acknowledged that, as systems become more complex, its "oversight approach needs to evolve".

Ahead of the tough questioning, Boeing launched a campaign to convince the flying public it is addressing the issues with the 737 Max, including a fix to the Manoeuvring Characteristics Augmentation System (MCAS) implicated in the deadly crashes.

Boeing unveiled the software changes - which Sinnett said were developed "after months of testing and hundreds of hours" - at the company's massive factory in Renton, Washington, and offered reassurances. The MCAS, which lowers the aircraft's nose if it detects a stall or loss of airspeed, was developed specifically for the 737 Max, which has heavier engines than its predecessor.

Among the changes, the MCAS will no longer repeatedly make corrections when the pilot tries to regain control and will automatically disconnect in the event of disagreements between the two "angle-of-attack" (AOA) sensors, the company said. The initial investigation into the October Lion Air crash in Indonesia, which killed all 189 people on board, found one of the AOA sensors failed but continued to transmit erroneous information to the MCAS. Boeing also will install a warning feature - at no cost - called a "disagree light" to indicate to the pilot when the left and right AOA sensors are out of sync.

The company also is revising pilot training, including for those already certified on the 737, to provide "enhanced understanding of the 737 Max" flight system and crew procedures. US pilots complained after the Lion Air crash that they had not been fully briefed on the system. Members of the Allied Pilots Association were among the 200 airline customers and others who spent the day at Boeing getting details. "With the software enhancements, we now have several layers of protection," American Airlines Captain Roddy Guthrie told reporters.

But despite the revisions, in Washington, DC Elwell seemed to cast doubt on the MCAS as the culprit, saying data collected from 57,000 flights in the US since the Max was introduced in 2017 showed not a single report of an MCAS malfunction. And the kind of flaw it could create is something "pilots are trained from day one" how to handle, he said.

Elwell faced questions about how certification for the Max was handled and why he did not immediately ground the aircraft after an Ethiopian Airlines 737 Max 8 crashed shortly after take-off near Addis Ababa on March 10, killing all 157 people onboard. The delay has given rise to suspicions of an excessively cosy relationship between regulators and the US aircraft manufacturer. He called the FAA "the gold standard" for aviation safety around the globe, and denied the agency was lax in reviews of the new systems in the Max, even though certification of some elements, including the MCAS, were eventually delegated to Boeing.

AERO South Africa set to go

The world’s leading trade show for general aviation comes to Southern Africa

Set to be Africa’s largest general aviation trade show, covering the full spectrum of services and products for the aviation industry. Discover what direction developments in the General Aviation industry are going.

The Aero South Africa conference and exhibition takes place from 4-6 July 2019 and is poised to be Africa’s largest general aviation trade show. The event will expose visitors to the latest advances, developments, products and services across the aviation industry.

From ultralights and gliders to business jets, helicopters, remotely piloted aircraft and electric aircraft as well as avionics and maintenance, various companies will be afforded the opportunity to showcase their cutting-edge products and services.

Meet with leading industry experts, enthusiasts, aviation companies, flight training schools, pilots, business jet owners and private aircraft owners over 3 days of excitement, demonstrations and face-to-face business meetings.

Aero South Africa is presented in corporation with Messe Friedrichshafen, the organisers of the industry’s major trade show that attracts 35,000 visitors from 60 different countries.

Who exhibit? will

If you fall into one of the following categories, then this event is a

must for your business:

Ultralight and glider manufacturers/distributors

Light/medium aircraft manufacturers/distributors

Helicopter manufacturers/distributors

Fuel, oil and lubricant suppliers to the aviation industry

Parts and accessories suppliers to the aviation industry.

Hangar rental companies

Avionics manufacturers/distributors

Catering companies

Airport management companies