The second crash of the Cessna SkyCatcher during spin testing has sent the light sport aircraft program back to wind tunnel testing as engineers tweak the plane’s design. Cessna announced the shift in the plane’s development schedule in a news release during Sun ‘n Fun last week, but did not say how long the plane’s deliveries would be delayed. The plane was once slated to be certified later this year. In September, the first test plane was destroyed during spin testing; the pilot parachuted out safely. In the March accident, the pilot was able to deploy the plane’s ballistic parachute, which then dragged the plane across the ground, seriously damaging it. In between the two crashes, Cessna tweaked the design of the vertical stabilizer.

The news was better for Cirrus Design at Sun ‘n Fun. The company announced that its SR22 models are now certified for flight into known icing. The system uses TKS fluid dispersed along the leading edges of the wings, horizontal stabilizer and vertical stabilizer. This is similar to the older system available on Cirrus’ planes, but which was only designed to help pilots leave icing conditions when accidentally flying into them. The newly certified known-icing system includes LED ice lights and equipment to spread the de-icing fluid across the front windshield and along the propeller blades. Pilots will be able to fly in icing conditions for up to 2.5 hours.

Piper CEO Jim Bass made clear last week that he’s not happy about the bad press business jets have been getting in recent months. In a speech at Sun ‘n Fun last Tuesday, Bass said general aviation manufacturers and users need to start standing up for themselves and asserting why GA is important. He pointed both to the jobs in manufacturing the industry creates, as well as the role planes can play in making companies operate more efficiently. Bass also had an update on the $2.2 million PiperJet, slated to begin deliveries early next year. The company has taken the plane up to 35,000 feet after installing landing gear doors and the pressurization system. The next phase of tests includes exploring the limits of the entire flight envelope, including installing a parachute to help the plane get out of spins it may enter during slow flight and stall testing.

When Yavuz Berke flew a Cessna Skyhawk from Canada into Wisconsin on April 6, officials quickly picked up his plane and scrambled fighters to intercept him as worries mounted that he might be a terrorist. But the fighters were never given permission to shoot down Berke’s plane, as officials soon learned from his girlfriend in Canada that he was suicidal, the FAA’s Air Traffic Organization reported. Berke flew south, past Madison, Wisc., and Chicago, before landing on a road in Missouri and fleeing to a nearby supermarket, where he was arrested after flying for more than four hours. FAA officials worked with their counterparts in Canada as the flight progressed to learn that while the plane had long-range fuel tanks, security cameras at his airport showed Berke didn’t take anything on the plane with him. When the FAA learned that Berke was suicidal, the fighters that had been following him gave him more space. Based on the flight’s path and range, officials were able to call ahead to controllers in airspace where the plane was likely to pass through, giving controllers time to clear other traffic out of the way.

The FAA on Friday released a database of bird strikes voluntarily reported by airports and airlines dating back to 1990, reversing course on a plan to keep the information hidden from public view. In an announcement Wednesday, the FAA said there was no safety risk in releasing the data. A “very small amount” of information, including personal phone numbers, was redacted, the agency said. The database currently allows basic searches by using a gargantuan pull-down menu to select an airport, airline or date range. The FAA said in the next four months, it will upgrade the online search functions to make them easier to use and to allow for more advanced searches. Users can also download the entire database in a format to be used in Microsoft Access. The airport with the most bird strikes was Denver International, which logged more than 2,400 incidents, the Christian Science Monitor reported. Many other airports reported 1,000 or more incidents over that time period. The airports with the greatest number of incidents causing severe damage to an airliner were New York’s JFK, with more than 80 such events, and Sacramento International Airport, with 56 occurrences. Because the reporting system is voluntary, it is difficult to make comparisons between airports. The FAA estimates that the incidents in the database may comprise just 20 percent of the actual number of bird strikes.

Later this year, the FAA will start the process to change some of the rules for medical helicopters, including requiring them to have terrain warning equipment installed. An FAA official told Congress last week the agency was responding to a recent spike in air ambulance deaths, many of which were due to pilot error and which safety advocates say could have been avoided, the New York Times reported. Because the rulemaking process is slow and must include time for public comments, it could be two years or more before new requirements go into effect. Already, some medical helicopter operators are balking at the possible requirement to add terrain warning equipment, since it can cost as much as $100,000 to install in each helicopter. Over the last two years, some of the deadliest on record for the industry, 35 people died in medical helicopter crashes. Many of those crashes occurred in poor weather and the helicopters were often low to the ground, striking terrain, trees or radio antennas in some of the accidents.

NTSB wants Zodiac LSA grounded after string of in-flight breakups

Six crashes of the Zodiac CH-601XL in the last three years are all related to an aerodynamic design problem and the planes should be grounded, the National Transportation Safety Board said last week. The light sport planes are vulnerable to aerodynamic flutter, in which the ailerons and elevator vibrate in flight, over-stressing the plane and causing structural failure. Ten people died in the six crashes the NTSB reviewed; in all of the crashes, the planes broke up, often during cruise flight. In two of the accidents, the wings “collapsed” or “folded up,” the NTSB said. Because the Zodiac was certified as a Special LSA, it did not have to go through the FAA’s certification process. Instead, the manufacturer just had to say the plane met industry design standards. In a posting on its Web site, Zenith said it doesn’t think flutter is an issue if the plane’s control cables are adjusted correctly. The company is considering the issues the NTSB raised, though it noted that the probable cause of every accident has not been established yet. The FAA is reviewing the NTSB’s recommendations but has not taken any action and therefore, the planes can continue flying for now.

This time last year, American Airlines was forced to ground its fleet of MD-80 jets to fix problems with how the planes had been repaired, stranding tens of thousands of travelers and costing the airline millions of dollars. A year later, American is being subjected to a three-month audit of its maintenance practices as the FAA cracks down on maintenance and other issues, the Dallas Morning News reported. Most recently, the agency discovered that thrust reversers on American’s fleet of Boeing 777s weren’t reassembled correctly, and that mechanics were using the wrong tool to pack emergency slides in some other aircraft. While the airline is complaining about having to comply with the strictest letter of the law, it hasn’t had to ground large portions of its fleet, either, due to the FAA’s willingness to give the airline a flexible repair schedule. The new oversight comes after the FAA came under the gun last year for letting airlines get away with maintenance lapses.

It’s been nearly three years since the Bush Administration’s FAA imposed work rules on its air traffic controllers. But assuming the Obama Administration’s pick to head the FAA, Randy Babbitt, is confirmed, working out a new contract with the union would be the agency’s No.-1 priority, National Public Radio reported. Babbitt is a former aviation consultant and lobbyist. Before that, he was the president of the Air Line Pilots Association. Government officials are already saying the new contract with the National Air Traffic Controllers Association will include raises and better work rules. The current rules lowered the base pay for new controllers and froze salaries for many others. Goal number two for Babbitt’s FAA will be the continued modernization of the nation’s air traffic control infrastructure. But how that project will move forward is unclear, since the transition to ADS-B is costly for the government, airlines and general aviation.

The single-engine Escape turboprop from Epic Aircraft made its first flight April 9. The 5-seat plane is designed to cruise at 412 knots, about 50 knots faster than the Epic LT, the company said on its Web site. Like the LT, the Escape is a kit-built aircraft and features a carbon-fiber airframe. Epic released few details about the flight, other than two photos of the plane in flight. The Escape features the same engine as the LT, but since it is a slightly scaled-down version, it is lighter and therefore can cruise faster, the company says. In other news, Epic CEO Rick Schrameck became the first person to hold a certificate of airworthiness on an Epic Victory single-engine jet. The Victory, like the LT and Escape, is considered an experimental plane. Epic has said little about how its production has been affected by the economic downturn, but it said last month that several more LTs gained certification, bringing to nearly 30 the number of LTs flying.

Officials in North Dakota got lots of use out of a Predator unmanned aerial vehicle when the Red River flooded recently. The drone was able to survey ice floes and flooding, transmitting real-time information to emergency managers, the Associated Press reported. The recent missions over North Dakota marked the first time a drone has been used to survey flooded area, though it has been used in other types of natural disasters. A nearby Air Force base normally uses the UAVs to patrol the Canadian border. But the Predator proved especially helpful during the Red River flooding because the affected area was so large, making surveys from the ground to assess the most vulnerable areas all but impossible. The Predator flew missions about 12 hours long at a time, though it could have stayed up even longer.