Built To Be A Lightweight, Hand-Controlled Aircraft Perfect To Support Able Flight

Andy Ovans, Maintenance Manager for the Aerospace Center for Excellence at Lakeland, Florida exhibited their “Spirit of Lakeland” Zenith 750, a group project that brought together high school students from the Central Florida Aerospace Academy and ACE staff mentors to complete the aircraft for use by the Lakeland Aero Club. The desired end result required some custom work and modification to bring the kit up to the spec, as well as the continuing practice and education of the high school students completing the plane.

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Some interesting rumblings are afoot, according to the Society of Aviation and Flight Educators (SAFE). A screen grab from a rumored FAA presentation has been making the rounds as an early "pre-decisional proposal." The proposal? Eliminate expirations for flight instructors and simultaneously restrict "exercising the privilege" based on required activity and experience like any other pilot certificate. SAFE notes that it's far too soon for CFI's to celebrate the change, since it will have to go through "a very long official NPRM – comment – process" before ma

Aero Linx: Mercy Flight Southeast, Inc. Mercy Flight Southeast, Inc. is a non-profit volunteer pilot organization involved in “public benefit flying.” We provide a variety of services to the community, but mostly we arrange free air transportation by private aircraft to distant medical facilities when commercial service is not available, impractical or simply not affordable. Mercy Flight Southeast serves the states of Alabama, Georgia, Mississippi, and South Carolina. We are a member of Air Charity Network, an association of charitable aviation organizations comprised of more than 7,000 pilots who flew more than 22,000 missions for 35,000 passengers nationwide in 2006.

DETRESFA (Distress Phase) [ICAO] The code word used to designate an emergency phase wherein there is reasonable certainty that an aircraft and its occupants are threatened by grave and imminent danger or require immediate assistance.

"These guidelines are mandatory for vertiport projects receiving federal grant-in-aid assistance and for federally obligated airports... The FAA recommends using the guidelines contained in this EB in the design of new civil vertiports, and for modifications of existing helicopter and airplane landing facilities to accommodate VTOL operations."  Source: The FAA's Office of Airports, who has begun requesting comments on the current draft for Vertiport Design. Their Engineering Brief 105 contains interim safety standards for those facilities that will soon dot the American landscape following the rapid proliferation of electric VTOL aircraft, making their execution part and parcel of safe and confidence-inspiring operations fo