AvantAir entire fleet grounded for mx Inspections?

[chief9404]

I bet this incident has something to do with the shutdown. The FAA must have threatened to shut them down if they didn't do it themselves. They (FAA) may have found more problems with Mtx. As well, how does a crew land and not realize part of the tail is missing? Good job guys! Thank God you didn't kill anyone.

Now the remaining owners/customers will flee.



NTSB investigates missing Avantair P180 elevator
Print
By: JOHN CROFT WASHINGTON DC 07:19 3 Aug 2012 Source:

The two pilots of an Avantair Piaggio P180 Avanti II that landed at the Henderson Executive airport in Nevada the morning of 28 July discovered during a post-flight check that the twin turboprop's left elevator was missing.

The finding came after a positioning flight of N146SL from Camarillo, California, to San Diego, followed by a Part 91 fractional flight from San Diego to Henderson with two passengers on board.

According to a preliminary report by the US National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB), the crew reported that they had a "non-eventful departure and flight from San Diego, and that the captain noticed that more back pressure on the flight controls was required for a normal landing upon arrival at Henderson".

NTSB says airport personnel at Camarillo on July 31 found the missing left elevator "near one of the runways".

A pusher aircraft, the Avanti II has a canard horizontal stabiliser surface with retractable flaps on the nose and a fixed horizontal T-tail stabilizer in the rear with left and right elevators.


©FLIGHTGLOBAL

Avantair says the aircraft suffered no damage as a result of the event, which the NTSB has classified as an accident. The company expected the aircraft to resume service by 4 August.

 

[jonjuan]

.....................

 

[fugazi]

I bet this incident has something to do with the shutdown. The FAA must have threatened to shut them down if they didn't do it themselves. They (FAA) may have found more problems with Mtx. As well, how does a crew land and not realize part of the tail is missing? Good job guys! Thank God you didn't kill anyone.

Now the remaining owners/customers will flee.



NTSB investigates missing Avantair P180 elevator
Print
By: JOHN CROFT WASHINGTON DC 07:19 3 Aug 2012 Source:

The two pilots of an Avantair Piaggio P180 Avanti II that landed at the Henderson Executive airport in Nevada the morning of 28 July discovered during a post-flight check that the twin turboprop's left elevator was missing.

The finding came after a positioning flight of N146SL from Camarillo, California, to San Diego, followed by a Part 91 fractional flight from San Diego to Henderson with two passengers on board.

According to a preliminary report by the US National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB), the crew reported that they had a "non-eventful departure and flight from San Diego, and that the captain noticed that more back pressure on the flight controls was required for a normal landing upon arrival at Henderson".

NTSB says airport personnel at Camarillo on July 31 found the missing left elevator "near one of the runways".

A pusher aircraft, the Avanti II has a canard horizontal stabiliser surface with retractable flaps on the nose and a fixed horizontal T-tail stabilizer in the rear with left and right elevators.


©FLIGHTGLOBAL

Avantair says the aircraft suffered no damage as a result of the event, which the NTSB has classified as an accident. The company expected the aircraft to resume service by 4 August.

I believe that was the beginning..the aircraft was pushed out of mx within a day or two of loosing its elevator. Flown with pax and was then discovered to still have elevator issues. A week later (after the second write up)that same aircraft went off of 24 at TEB. That is why I believe the FAA has a hard on for the certificate. This is just the story I was told..

 

[ghostrider64]

There is ZERO doubt that AvantAir does in fact compete with NJA. I've seen many former owners getting into their aircraft.

That said no one wants to see this instability. It would be far better if we were all growing. However growth has been stagnant and decline for how many years now? Too many...

You can bet that NJA sales people are working overtime trying to,exploit those deep Berkshire Hathaway pockets. It was proven in the not so distant past, that WB was indeed willing to hold up the financial end during crisis. For someone who's time is worth a substantial amount, there really is no operator backed to such a degree as NJA.

Perhaps AvantAir is indicative of the greater downturn, willing to offer a product at a substantial discount, to those that see dollars before anything else? My question is, if this is a shutdown, what operator will be next? These aren't isolated financials at AvantAir. There are more than a few with slim financial backing.

Like I said, I'm not gloating, I'm concerned with the industry as a hole. An industry run by people who are so desperate to have increased sales, that they do so at a price point where success long term is impossible. We need this industry to appear stronger than AIRLINES, not weaker, and what is happening at AvantAir may just make more owners question the reliability of our collective product....

 

[glasspilot]

There is ZERO doubt that AvantAir does in fact compete with NJA. I've seen many former owners getting into their aircraft.

That said no one wants to see this instability. It would be far better if we were all growing. However growth has been stagnant and decline for how many years now? Too many...

You can bet that NJA sales people are working overtime trying to,exploit those deep Berkshire Hathaway pockets. It was proven in the not so distant past, that WB was indeed willing to hold up the financial end during crisis. For someone who's time is worth a substantial amount, there really is no operator backed to such a degree as NJA.

Perhaps AvantAir is indicative of the greater downturn, willing to offer a product at a substantial discount, to those that see dollars before anything else? My question is, if this is a shutdown, what operator will be next? These aren't isolated financials at AvantAir. There are more than a few with slim financial backing.

Like I said, I'm not gloating, I'm concerned with the industry as a hole. An industry run by people who are so desperate to have increased sales, that they do so at a price point where success long term is impossible. We need this industry to appear stronger than AIRLINES, not weaker, and what is happening at AvantAir may just make more owners question the reliability of our collective product....

Typo or Freudian slip?

 

[ghostrider64]

Typo or Freudian slip?

In its entirety LOL

 

[BEfly]

Furlough letters now

 

[Pervis]

All the best folks.

 

[B314Clipper]

Clearwater's Avantair voluntarily grounds its fleet of planes for safety reasons

By Jamal Thalji, Times Staff Writer
In Print: Saturday, October 27, 2012



Avantair shut down its fleet this week after one of its Piaggo P180 planes lost a left tail elevator sometime before it landed at a Nevada airport in July.



CLEARWATER — Avantair, a company that offers customers the chance to own shares of private planes at a fraction of the cost of buying their own jet, grounded its entire fleet after one of its aircraft lost its left tail elevator flying on the other side of the country in July.

The decision to halt all flight operations also led the company to furlough a significant number of its 500 employees while experts perform a "nose to tail" safety inspection of each plane and review maintenance records.

Avantair, which operates its "fractional ownership" business model out of St. Petersburg-Clearwater International Airport, said it voluntarily stood down its fleet of nearly 60 Piaggio Avanti planes in coordination with the Federal Aviation Administration.

The July incident sparked an investigation that led Avantair to stand down select aircraft on Saturday for inspection. Then, on Wednesday, management decided to ground the entire fleet. The company did not say if a specific issue with that model of plane led to that decision.

"For the past week, we have been undertaking extensive inspections of our fleet and our operating procedures," said Avantair's CEO, Steven Santo, in a prepared statement.

The company said it expects to resume flights in the coming week and will bring back employees when it starts flying again. But the company did not say how many workers have been or will be furloughed in the mean time.

Its fractional ownership business model allows customers to buy shares of the company's private planes so they can fly where they want when they want to. The company has 3,000 to 4,000 flights a month, and a 2010 Tampa Bay Times article put the price of a 2 1/2 hour flight to New York at about $6,500.

But the company's stock price has taken a beating since it was $1.35 in November. On Friday it opened at 18 cents, fell to 10 cents, then closed at 20 cents.

The incident that led Avantair to shut down its entire operation took place on July 28. According to a preliminary report from the National Transportation Safety Board, a Piaggio P180 took off from Camarillo Airport in California, picked up two passengers in San Diego, then landed at Henderson Executive Airport in Nevada.

After landing in Nevada, the report said, crew members inspected the plane and discovered the left elevator missing from the tail. The elevator helps control the plane's pitch, allowing the pilots to aim the nose.

Two crew members and two passengers aboard the plane were not injured. The crew noticed nothing unusual during the San Diego leg of the flight, the NTSB said, but the captain reported needing to use more back pressure on the flight controls to land normally in Nevada.

The NTSB report said that the Piaggio P180 had been flying without the left tail elevator at least since it took off that day from Camarillo. Airport personnel there found the elevator near a runway on July 31. The plane was repaired and back in the air days later.

Avantair said it hired safety expert Nick Sabatini, a former FAA official, to oversee the review. Most of the fleet has been recalled to Clearwater for inspection, a company spokesman said. Other planes are being inspected around the nation.

Avantair said it's the only fractional operator that uses Piaggio's rear-facing, turbo-propped planes, which can approach the speeds of conventional business jets while burning less fuel.

The company said it is in touch with its customers about the situation but did not say if it was purchasing commercial flights or chartering private jets to accommodate them.

Times researcher John Martin contributed to this report. Jamal Thalji can be reached at [email protected] or (813) 226-3404.

 

[Club ORD FO]

So whats going on with the "furlough." It is just a day by day thing until the operation is back up an running?