It's hard, these days, to read or hear a sentence about Dubai that doesn't end with a staggering financial figure, usually in the many billions or at least the hundreds of millions. Sheikh Al Mahtoum's vision of Dubai's world-class aerospace center is no different, and investors the world over are trying to get in on the action since its announcement this summer that the project was now well underway.
25 miles outside of Dubai, the land on which contractors from the UAE and Europe have begun construction was slated for development 30 years ago (the equivalent of a century or two in any other developed country). The project adds up to $82 billion in cutting edge technology, aircraft, surrounding residential areas and training options.
At the heart of the plan is the $10 billion Al Maktoum International Airport, which would be twice as big as London's Heathrow and Chicago's sprawling O'Hare airports combined, or roughly double the size of Hong Kong.
More proof of Russia's economic power: the Eclipse 500 Very Light Jet will soon be made in Russia. The Eclipse is the first foreign jet aircraft to be made in Russia. Production will start next year in Ulyanovsk, the hometown of Lenin. Dutch investment company Etirc Aviation, Eclipse Aviation and the Russian Aviastar aircraft complex have laid the foundations for the new assembly plant. Russia's growing crop of millionaires will be able to pick up the plane for $1.5 million. Etirc Aviation has announced that they plan to produce up to 500 jets a year.
If you've been itching to get your hands on your own Eclipse 500 private jet, today is your lucky day. That's right, Eclipse is listing on of their first Eclipse 500 private jets up for auction on eBay starting today. The list price is $1,719.942.60 and the reserve will be $1,633.945.47. Your money gets you serial # 000038 of the new very light jet. And the company just started making deliveries of the six-passenger jet last December so you will likely be the first on your block to have one. To claim your prize you have to pick up the plane at the Eclipse plant in Albuquerque, New Mexico and the winning bidder also receives participation in Eclipse's Type Rating Training program for one person. The auction ends on August 10.
The latest plane from Eclipse Aviation is the Eclipse Concept Jet, a a single-engine four-place aircraft. The concept plane represents Eclipse's vision of what a single engine VLJ should be. It's not for sale and is being used for market research.
Aero News Network was there for the first flight of the plane, a 70 minute trip on July 2, and has photos and videos of the experience. The plane was built in just over 200 days. The goal is to have the the plane hit goals of 345 knots, 41,000 feet and a range in excess of 1250 nautical miles. No word yet on when or if the concept will go into production.
Giving a new meaning to the words wine flight, the Chandelle Winery specializes in wines with aviation art. The Sonoma winery takes its name from an aviation term used to describe a 180-degree change in direction and an increase in altitude. To celebrate the 80th anniversary of Charles Lindbergh's New York-to-Paris flight, the winery is offering a special limited edition labeled wine called The 19th Hour, The Spirit of St Louis. The 2004 Sonoma County Cabernet Sauvignon and 2005 Chardonnay Sonoma County wines have a label created by aviation artist Keith Ferris as well as a special 80th anniversary medallion. A portion of the sales will go to the Lindbergh Foundation, which supports technological solutions to improve the environment for a sustainable future. A three bottle box of two 2004 Cabernet Sauvignon and one 2005 Chardonnay Spirit of St Louis 80th Anniversary Edition sells for $70.
Maybe you never got a chance to fly on the Concorde before the last flight in 2003, but soon you will have the opportunity to own a piece of it. Beginning September 28th and continuing through October 1st, 835 lots of Concorde related items will be sold to the highest bidder. Included in the sale is everything from spare parts to pilot's uniforms, with most bids expected to range from $67-$400. If you have a little more to spend and possibly a larger place to house your collection, you can bid on the plane's landing gear, which weighs 1.5 tons and is expected to fetch upwards of $2,700. Don't be surprised if these estimates are low. In 2003, the Concorde's trademark needle nose sold for $634,000 although it was valued at only $13,000.
The proceeds of the auction will finance a planned airline park in the French City of Toulou. The Aeroscopia will open in 2010 and feature the history of Aerospatiale Toulouse, the maker of Concorde.
The first customer-painted Airbus A380 has been revealed. Singapore Airlines has the honor of being the first to splash their logo on the ultimate doubledecker jumbo jet. It took 21 days for 100 workers in four shifts to polish and paint the blue and gold Singapore Airlines logo and the name "Singapore Airlines" across the massive plane. The job also took over 580 gallons of paint. Airbus is trying to minimize the ecological damage from the massive project, electrostatic pistols are used to minimize paint mist and used air is cleaned and washed through a multi-stage cleaning process. Singapore Airline will receive the aircraft in October.
We've been waiting for this news since mid 2005 when we first started covering this company, Eclipse Aviation has finally delivered their first very light jet, the Eclipse 500, and just before the end of 2006 too. AV Web reports that the first Eclipse 500 was delivered to a customer on Sunday, New Year's Eve. A formal delivery ceremony will follow at the company headquarters in Albuquerque, N.M. The first customer Eclipse 500 went to co-owners David Crowe, a private owner, and Jet-Alliance, a shared jet ownership company. Crowe is planning to fly recreationally and the jet will be part of Jet- Alliances shared ownership program. Eclipse has another 37 planes currently on the line and goal of delivering 500 planes before the end of 2007 but with a backlog of 2,500 orders you may have to wait a while for yours.
Buy a plane, get a car, that's the new offer from Comp Air Inc. From now until the end of the year they are offering new Chevy Aveos to buyers of selected models of its airplanes. The offer applies to seven of Comp Air's kit models. The offer means that those who trek down to Merritt Island, Florida to build their own aircraft will have their own way to get around and two new rides to take home. The Aveo has an MSRP of $9,350-$13,050. Probably not the car of your dreams but it's still a free car.
Those who build their aircraft at home are eligible for the new car too as long as they are willing to fly down and drive it home. Comp Air makes composite, kit-built airplanes from two to 11 seats which are powered by piston, turboprop and turbo.Their latest model is the carbon fiber Comp 12 shown here. The high-tech turbine aircraft sells for $249,000 less engine, avionics and interior.
You are looking at the only Douglas A-20 capable of flight is for sale. This rare plane, which has been exhibited in several flight museums, was impeccably restored. This plane was part of three different Air Force units as a trainer but was never in combat. After World War II, it was part of the 474 military planes sold to Paul Mantz, one of Hollywood's most famous stunt pilots, for use in movies and as camera planes. The plane was later sold, abandoned and then bought and restored by William J. Farah in 1970. It has bounced in and out of museums including the National Air & Space Museum, the Liberal Flight Museum and the Lone Star Flight Museum. It is selling for $1,150,000 through Courtesy Aircraft.
Not content with
fashion and a burgeoning hotel
empire, Versace will now be designing interiors for
private jets. The fashion company has announced a new collaboration with Tag
Group SA to design interiors for the Boeing BBJ, Bombardier Global Express and other private jets. The interiors
will be shown at a British Air Show this summer. The prototype is described as having a white and black scheme
including white leather chairs and black carpeting.
The already competitive London to New York flight
market is about to get a bit tighter. We've already covered Eos and MAXjet which both offer the same
route. Silverjet Limited will offer low fare, all business class flights. CNN reports that Silverjet is currently raising money
to get on London's Alternative Investment Market in May. They expect to start business class service from Luton to
Newark within six to nine months after getting on the market. They eventually plan to run ten aircraft to a variety of
destinations. Like MAXjet, Silverjet will offer around 100 seats which are flatbeds. The average roundtrip is expected
to be $1,700.
Want to be the first to be allowed to use
your phone in flight? Then you will want to fly Air France. Breaking Travel News reports that they will take
delivery in early 2007 of the first Airbus A318 with the On Air GSM equipment which lets you use your cell phone or
BlackBerry during flight. Air France will use the aircraft during a six-month trial of the new service testing it out
on short flights within Europe and North Africa. As much as it will be convenient, I think I will mourn the days of the
phone-free flight.
We saw
something similar once on eBay but
this article in the Bend Bulletin goes in depth on the "Jetmousine" created by Dan Harris. In Bend,
Oregon, Harris turns old private jets into luxury limos. He is currently at work on his first project which has a
bright red exterior and a plasma TV, high-definition TVs, an 8,000 watt sound system and plenty of leather upholstery.
The first one which costs around $1 million, has been sold to Exotic Coach, a limo company in Chicago, and is street-legal.
It uses a 1974 Lear jet fuselage with chrome wheels and a 400-horsepower 8100 cc Vertec Vortec engine
from a Chevy truck.
The Concorde may have been retired
but that doesn't mean that fast flight is a thing of the past. Enter the scramjet, an Australian bullet-shaped jet
engine that may one day take people from London to Sydney in two hours. The scramjet engine created by QinetiQ (a British defense company) and will be tested today in the Australian
desert. The scramjet operates at speeds greater than Mach 5 and works by rapidly sucking in oxygen and burning hydrogen
fuel. The test for the latest evolution of the scramjet engine will fly for five seconds, 325 kilometers high (over 200
miles) in a parabolic arch. It is hoped that eventually scramjets could be used to get from one side of the world to
the other. It could also have military applications as well as becoming a possible replacement for the space shuttle.
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