Just Julie's Takes Archives - JulietBravoFox Media

March 28, 2025March 28, 2025

The Space Gal & Pink Overalls

When a child decides to dress up like a scientist for Halloween, you know that STEM education has struck home.

When that child chooses the pink overalls worn by The Space Gal, Emily Calandrelli, you recognize the impact that one woman’s YouTube channel has had on the zeitgeist.

Calandrelli joined the Women in Aviation 2025 conference on March 27 with a keynote session that drove straight to the point: Representation leads to the Belonging that powers Drive and Opportunity. She contends that success doesn’t happen without all three working in concert.

I couldn’t agree more.

With 1.1 million followers on Instagram (@thespacegal) and a YouTube channel with 151K subscribers (@EmilysScienceLab), Calandrelli appears to have hit a sweet spot in the market. But upon closer examination, she revealed, she remains part of a tiny minority of TV/streaming science presenters who are female: less than 2 percent.

Yet her latest series, Emily’s Science Lab (based on her previous work, Emily’s Wonder Lab on Netflix), has resonated. And Wonder Lab continues to draw viewers, ranking in the top 13 percent of all shows and movies.

Why are female presenters considered a “financial risk” for science programming? Emily Calandrelli gives the context. [Credit: Julie Boatman]

This success flies in the face of the chorus of naysayers she encountered when pitching her concepts to traditional networks like the Discovery Channel, where female presenters on STEM topics are viewed as a “financial risk.” The context for the resistance she experienced isn’t going away, unfortunately, but growing stronger (amazingly) in the backlash that trying to shove women back into “traditional roles” (whatever that means… ).

“Their arguments are, one, men don’t want to watch women on television. We scare them. And two, that there’s simply no market for female viewship in science.”

Calandrelli counters this perception with the example set by Reese Witherspoon and the production company she founded, Hello Sunshine, specifically created to develop and execute TV and other media written by, directed by, and starring women. Witherspoon’s success stands in plain sight: Big Little Lies (with 43 percent male viewship). The Morning Show. Little Fires Everywhere. The Last Thing He Told Me. Gone Girl (with 40 percent male viewership).

She related the catalyst for Hello Sunshine: “In one speech [Witherspoon] gives, she says, ‘You know, I would get exasperated reading, script after script, where there would be a woman in an emergency scenario, and in that emergency scenario, she’d stop and look to the guy and say, ‘Well, what do you do now?’ And she said, ‘Do you know literally any woman in your life who would have no idea what to do?'” Certainly, women pilots can relate to this, completely!

After she flew into space on a Blue Origin transport in November 2024, Calandrelli vowed to translate that experience—and her celebrity as the 100th woman in space—to reach further than the series of children’s books she’s authored. Emily’s Science Lab takes 100 experiments from those books and brings them to life in Technicolor rainbows. The sets entice young viewers, but also provide them with a down-to-earth role model they can emulate.

Recruitment comes down to representation: we feel belonging and can achieve goals when we see others like us in the room. [Credit: Julie Boatman]

Calandrelli points back to her college life, as she studied mechanical and aerospace engineering at West Virginia University, where she discovered her own sense of belonging amongst her professors and the handful of female engineering students in her classes.

“When I got to college,” she said, “I found a sense of belonging with the female engineers, which there were not many, and we all became close in those classes. And my professors, they became mentors who introduced me to opportunities that I could never have had otherwise.”

I contend that most of us who have succeeded in aerospace fields can relate back to at least one critical mentor of our gender. Perhaps, as in my experience, they didn’t meet that person until later. For me, it was after I earned my flight instructor certificate, after college at the University of Colorado at Boulder. In the Colorado Chapter of the Ninety-Nines, which I joined in 1993, I met two pivotal mentors: Donna Miller and Gretchen Jahn.

At the time, Miller had taken on a special role at Jeppesen, where she served as a personal assistant to the legendary Captain Elrey Jeppesen, as he entered late-stage retirement. She helped him collect his memories and put them in order, an honor to be sure. Miller did me a solid when a position posted in Jepp’s Aviation Courseware department for a technical writer—she walked in my resume. Miller went on to fly for the airlines, retiring earlier this year as a captain for American.

Then, I met Jahn, who co-owned a Cessna 182RG with her husband Karl, and she needed a flight review. From that basis our friendship formed, and over the years I cheered her on as she secured venture capital for a software start-up, and then joined Mooney as its CEO. Jahn followed that with “rescue CEO” efforts at Remos in Germany, and Alpha Aviation in New Zealand. All along, I went to her for advice at various stages of my career, and from her I learned to acknowledge and balance what I wanted to achieve with what resonated personally. And even more so, seeing how she navigated both the hits and misses helped me understand that I could survive when I inevitably faced my own successes and mistakes.

Gretchen, Ruby Sheldon, and me at the Air Race Classic 2005, flying the Mooney M20R Ovation. [From the author’s collection]

Yes, Calandrelli is right. Both Miller and Jahn showed me directly what was possible, and actively helped me achieve it.

Representation leads to Belonging, which powers Drive and Opportunity.

March 27, 2025March 27, 2025

No Minced Words: WAI’s CEO Kicks Off WAI25 Tapping Into ‘Outrage’

“A world where the sky is open to all—where aviation and aerospace dreams are possible without barriers.”

Without barriers. If you had to encapsulate the mission of Women in Aviation International, that’s it. The fact we’re even *having* a conversation about the raising of those barriers in 2025 is unbelievable.

But here we are.

WAI25 Meets the Moment

Each time winter breaks through to the first signs of spring, I weigh our ever-expanding travel schedule to determine which aerospace events to attend against three factors:

What I must attend
What I want to attend
What I can prioritize down in order to say yes to 1 & 2

The Women in Aviation International Conference—which I’ve made a part of my life since 1999—once more went from a “want” to a “must.”

Now, more than ever, this association’s critical mission meets the global moment as it faces a list of challenges, many coming from the U.S. government leadership, that would have been unimaginable a year ago.

Every day brings news of more “takedowns”: the violent scrubbing of resources and references supporting diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives from websites to policy manuals, in the interest of tilting the playing field back to where it was in some vaguely unspecified time before we recognized the importance of representation across our workforce and communities.

WAI CEO Lynda Coffman pulled zero punches kicking off the conference on Thursday, March 27, at the Gaylord Rockies Resort & Convention Center in Denver at the opening general session.

“As we sit here now, our hard-earned achievements and accomplishments are being erased,” said Coffman. “The policies that are perpetuating barriers and negative stereotypes will only reduce the number of women who can or want to enter aviation.”

So why should we care? Coffman—speaking from experience given her previous role in senior leadership at United Airlines—drew a direct connection to the bottom line for the aerospace industry. “That will lead to smaller talent pipelines for the industry. And those smaller talent pipelines mean a smaller talent pool for the industry, which means thinner pickings for the most qualified people.” That’s not good for anyone—especially when we compare the industry’s “stellar” safety record under these broadening initiatives and their positive impact on the recruitment of the best people.

Tapping into the spirit of the room, which numbered several hundred young people interested and invested in aviation sitting next to seasoned aviation professionals, Coffman asked how many felt disoriented, abandoned, and, yes, angry, given the current state of affairs. Hands flew up. “Yes, you should be feeling angry, because the rhetoric that’s down there right now is a damn outrage.

“How dare anyone say we are less than, or less qualified because of our gender? It’s utter BS.”

Coffman urged those taking part in #WAI25 to move those feelings to collective action:

Stand together and make their voices heard.
Reach out to those women and allies feeling isolated, singled out, or anxious.
Grow the community, with the stretch goal to lift membership in WAI to 25,000 by April 15.

“Let’s also make this a day,” said Coffman, “that we’ll send the message that we will stand together, we will not be undermined, we will not allow our talents and qualifications to be questioned, and we will not stand for our full contribution to history to be erased.”

February 20, 2025February 20, 2025

GAMA 2025: Reading the Room

The year kicks off—at least from a general aviation perspective—with the annual GA Shipments and Billings Report produced by the General Aviation Manufacturers Association (GAMA) and its associated press conference held in concert with meetings of the association’s board and various committees.

With the National Press Club tied up, GAMA hosted the conference at the George Washington University’s Jack Morton Auditorium near Foggy Bottom in Washington, D.C., which honestly made for a more comfortable venue in light of the packed house that may have overwhelmed the Press Club’s more intimate quarters. Youth infused the production, which was executed by talented GWU students in concert with GAMA’s highly professional team.

The delivery and billing numbers didn’t surprise me—generally positive news there. Once more, much is at stake as the playing field shifts again before our eyes.

The vibe in the room sets the tone for the year. In 2020, the specter of COVID was just beginning, with lockdowns not yet in place in the U.S. but challenging already in Europe. In 2021, the Russian invasion of Ukraine had just transpired days before. Supply chain repercussions echoed through 2022 and 2023, with FAA Reauthorization looming large last year.

With as much change taking place on a daily basis as we’re seeing this first quarter of 2025, it wouldn’t surprise me to see a necessary change in course prompted by one of several factors in play:

Tariffs by the U.S. and retaliatory answers from Canada, Mexico, China
The charge to slash U.S. government regulations and only replace them at a 10:1 ratio
Egregious use tax implementation in Europe, targeting business aviation
Deeply cutting personnel reductions at key agencies, including FAA, DoT, and Department of Commerce
And, oh yes, privatization of the National Airspace System in the U.S.

To kick off, Pete Bunce, current chairman and CEO of GAMA, clearly bases the association’s strategy on tariffs based on what transpired with the first go-round of the current administration, when tariffs were floated and walked back. “We want to work with the administration on smart policies to be able to go in not to debilitate this industry,” said Bunce.

Using a typical GA powerplant—whether piston, turboprop, turbine, or electric—as an example, Bunce illustrated the impact on an industry that already suffers from a stressed supply chain. “[As for] tariffs and our supply chain…the challenges have been vast. And when you think about supply chain, it’s not easy to switch a supplier. When you go and switch a supplier, you’ve got to recertify that supplier. So that burns up resources from the regulators on either side of the Atlantic… So if we add tariffs on top of that to debilitate the industry, that can have very severe unintended consequences. Whether you’re talking about aluminum, whether you’re just talking about cross-border transactions—remember, when we produce an engine, parts and pieces cross borders all the time—if you’re starting to add tariffs to each one of those transactions, [they] become significant.”

Another echo of the previous charge to slash regulations may also have consequences that kill a lot of good work done by industry and government in partnership to streamline the certification process (MOSAIC), encourage bilateral agreements between FAA and EASA, and integrate UAS into the National Airspace System. “We in aviation can’t do anything without regs, policy, and guidance,” said Bunce, “and a lot of those are enabling regulations. How we interpret this, how it was in the first administration—2 to 1, now it’s 10 to 1—how we are going to actualize that to keep the momentum going forward on policy and guidance?”

An Oxford Economics impact study quantified the positive effect the business aviation industry has in the EU, in terms of jobs and revenue. [Credit: Julie Boatman]

A move in Europe to enact Draconian passenger use taxes on business aircraft forms a third distinct threat to the forward momentum of the industry. France stands to implement a “green” tax that would charge up to 2100 Euro per passenger on every business flight operating in the country. It’s an absolutely fallacious means by which to purportedly limit business aviation emissions—and would only serve to kneecap the very segment of the aerospace industry that is the incubator for innovation. It’s a sector that a recent Oxford Economics study commissioned by GAMA and the European Business Aviation Association reported 440,000 jobs and an economic input of 110 billion Euro into the European economy.

“But what are we seeing over there?” asked Bunce. “We are seeing policies that attack our sector of aviation but also taxes that hit every sector of civil aviation—and these taxes aren’t what we thought about three or four years ago that dealt just with sustainability. These taxes are debilitative taxes that are simply going to be tax revenue for France or for other countries out there. The French government just signed into law a tax policy that has the potential of charging every passenger on a business aviation aircraft turboprop or jet up to 2100 euro per flight.

“Think about that,” he continued. “If you have an economy in Europe that boasts that they are shifting from a strategy of the green deal to the green industrial deal, and your major pillar in that strategy is competitiveness, you just shot yourself in the foot by doing this. Because we all know it’s business aviation that gives companies advantage whether you’re doing business in Europe or you’re doing it around the globe.”

The grand irony is that France need only look across its landscape for the very businesses that are spurring the “green industrial deal,” such as Daher, which in its recent annual press conference reported on core business across all its pillars pushing emphatically towards the sustainable future. From AI optimization of energy consumption to the utilization of advanced thermoplastics within its TBM and Kodiak aircraft—and culminating in whatever the follow-on to Eco-Pulse will be—Daher is not blasé—or isolated—in its commitment to our collective future.

The already-declining EU market for business jets faces strong headwinds if tax policy such as that recently voted in by the French government comes to pass, or expands to other countries. [Credit: Julie Boatman]

But we’re not done yet… other specters raised in Bunce’s comments included the privatization of the NAS, an ongoing fight. This time around, it’s in the name of modernizing and streamlining the outdated air traffic control system.

However, within the FAA Reauthorization bill and associated appropriations, the funding and support for required upgrades to equipment and advanced training for personnel are already earmarked and ready for implementation. If acting FAA Administrator Chris Rocheleau—a former NBAA exec and well regarded by the GA industry—is allowed to move this F&E forward, these issues untangle towards resolution. “But why would we want to go into that fight again when we can go and look at making this system better,” said Bunce. “I think if we’re distracted by another privatization fight, we’ve just lost this unique opportunity that all of civil aviation is united and said, ‘Congress, you can help us by appropriating more money in F&E, but also letting us use the trust fund more wisely, working with the appropriators to do it very smartly.’”

The GA Leadership panel, composed of GAMA chairman Henry Brooks, of Collins Aerospace, Pete Bunce, outgoing CEO of GAMA, and Jim Viola, CEO of VAI and incoming GAMA CEO. [Credit: Julie Boatman]

Finally, large-scale and immediate personnel reductions across the U.S. government have made the news every single day since January 20. And the FAA has not been immune, with an initial reduction of 400 employees imminent—and this to an agency that is already running at about an 800-personnel deficit, according to various reports. It feels particularly galling to have that salvo across the bow in the wake of the mid-air collision at Washington National last month, in which it appears understaffing may have played a part.

To this, Bunce returned to the presumption that we can trust the administration to stand by its commitments when the dust has settled. “We’re trying to understand with them what the impacts are,” he said, “and the numbers don’t sound like they’re as many as they were first reported. We know that the morale within the FAA was boosted by…the declaration late last week [that] those that have direct responsibility for safety—their jobs are safeguarded. In fact, they aren’t even allowed the ‘early out,’ for lack of a better term, and that helps with morale. It says, ‘You are important to this industry.’ But we are going to lose some support people out there. That just means we have to exploit efficiency.”

In closing, Bunce noted the need to continue to build the stories that convey the wide-ranging and deeply felt impact general aviation has on the world. GAMA, in concert with AOPA and other aviation associations, commissioned a study of their own through PWC to quantify that impact.

It’s human nature to base predictions of future action on past behavior. My biggest concern lies in whether that can be applied to each of these threats—and how we can fortify ourselves as an industry to weather those ensuing storms.

Reading the room gave me the same feeling. Can we trust those now leading the U.S. government to listen to our stories and follow through on their commitments?

Piston airplane deliveries showed the strongest growth by segment. [Credit: Julie Boatman]

December 10, 2024December 10, 2024

Sustainable Lessons from Eco-Pulse Reported by Daher, Safran, and Airbus

With the report from Daher, Safran, and Airbus on the Eco-Pulse hybrid-electric TBM-inflected tech demonstrator, the collective teams have the opportunity to stay future-forward—and incorporate lessons learned. In the interest of meeting the industry’s sustainable aviation objectives, we all have a vested interest in these outcomes.

A media briefing preceded the LinkedIn liverstream on December 10, from Tarbes, France. Leaders from each company—including Pascal Laguerre, CTO of Daher; Éric Dalbiès, SEVP of strategy/CTO of Safran; and Jean-Baptiste Manchette, head of propulsion of tomorrow from Airbus—joined project lead and head of aircraft design Christophe Robin from Daher. Over the past five years since the project debuted at Paris Air Show in 2019, I’ve stayed in touch with Robin on its progress, which will inform the way forward for all three companies.

The panel of leaders from Daher, Safran, and Airbus

What Is Eco-Pulse?

The Eco-Pulse project is critical for these leaders among aerospace OEMs because hybrid-electric propulsion forms a bridge between current jet-A (sustainable aviation fuel) burning turbine engines and full-scale electric propulsion. The aircraft at its heart is a technology demonstrator, in which a standard Pratt & Whitney PT6 turboprop engine remains in place on a tried-and-tested Daher TBM 900-series airframe. It’s joined by six Safran ePropellers on the wings integrated with a Safran-built turbogenerator and Airbus’ high-voltage battery pack (at 800 volts DC and up to 350 kW of power). A power distribution and rectification unit (PDRU) protects the high voltage network and distributes power via high-voltage supply harnesses.

The Eco-Pulse flew for the last time, perhaps, in July 2024. [Credit: Daher/Jean-Marie Urlacher]

The pilot can use the six motors propelling distributed lift over the wing via a unified joystick-style flight control, via the integrated flight deck. It’s a unique marriage of tech dreams and true life—the Eco-Pulse project allowed for demonstration of these technologies within the envelope of safety required by the simple fact it was taking flight in the real world, not a simulation.

Flying it remains key to showing the operational safety necessary to move forward.

The flight testing took place mostly with the PT6 in “transparent” mode.

Flight Testing the Eco-Pulse

In the livestream, the flight test team described the progressive activation of the ePropellers and the eventually complete electrical actuation of the airframe and powertrain. During flight test, most of the hours of electric flight were conducted with the PT6 in “transparent” mode—not producing power, but not completely shut down.

Each step provided data to the respective companies, building on successive knowledge. For example, much was learned by flying the aircraft under its fly-by-wire (FBW) system, and under speed constraints. Stalls as well as the top speed of the demonstrator (190 kts) were explored. Slower airspeeds—as opposed to high-speed flight—provided some of the richest data, as the effect of the distributed lift caused by the ePropellers showed up most with lower in-flight airflow.

“You can imagine when when you have this propeller on the wing,” said Robin in the briefing. “The behavior is really different—you ‘blow’ the wing so the efficiency of the wing is completely different, thanks to the blowing effect of these six propellers. You increase the performance at takeoff, [and] during some maneuvers, and you can play with the flight controls, playing with the different[ial] power of these six engines. By doing that, you can play with the trajectory of the aircraft.”

Since the first hybrid-electric test flight on November 29, 2023, the Eco-Pulse has logged more than 100 hours in 50 flights, during which the team also noted other performance improvements, as well as the ability to reduce cabin noise with synchronization of the six propellers.

Unexpected Lessons: A Lot of Power

Two key learnings included a big challenge—managing the 800 VDC battery and the harness that distributes the power—as well as understanding how it will be maintained and serviced in real-world conditions. Things are just different in the air: A battery fire, for one, is more complicated than in ground-based vehicles, and because of the presence of the traditional turboprop engine, that fire may occur in close proximity to the fuel system.

The team learned from these issues: “Each unexpected issue on the aircraft has been ‘good news’,” said Robin. “There’s been…bad things, but also good news, because when on a subject…we didn’t think about, and Safran didn’t think about, that means that there was something real [to test and discover], That’s the point of making a demonstrator, to be in real life and not making only Powerpoints.

“We had some integration issues about the harness,” he continued. “It seems easy to install [an electrical distribution] harness with 800 volts in real life. [But] when you get more knowledge, [it’s] not that easy, especially when you have fuel, which is not too far away. You have to take care of all the dysfunctional cases. And we learned that some of them were probably not taken at the right level. We learned a lot on the integration of the harness.”

“We learned a lot also about the operation of high voltage aircraft,” he added, “because we are thinking design as an engineer [during] certification, but at the end of the day, well, you have an aircraft, and if you have 800-volt batteries, how you do you operate? How do the maintenance people take care of it?”

Ground Testing of High-Voltage Systems 2023

Daher + Safran + Airbus

Collaboration between the three giants was also a key takeaway: They essentially learned how to transform the relationship between airframe and powerplant OEMs as well as how to leverage the agility of start-ups that were brought into the development of the Eco-Pulse. The marketable aircraft program will depend on this coordination.

“So for the time being, we can enjoy something like 10-year periods, starting 2020 till the end of the decade, where we can focus our engineering teams on the preparation of the most disruptive technologies for the future,” said Pascal Laguerre in the media briefing. “That’s really an opportunity to make this happen. So we see this opportunity between our companies to align our goals at the same moment in time with the same mindset, the same intent, and saying, ‘Well, none of us individually can do it, can make it happen.’”

Sourcing of raw materials, including the rare earth metals needed for the batteries, from places on the globe that are not secure, is another takeaway from the program. Recycling those materials in a circular economy is vital to meeting several objectives, including those overall to support sustainable aviation. Finding other ways of approaching component construction and reuse is also critical.

Thrust Performance & Flight Controls 2024

What Comes Next for Daher?

The follow-on aircraft program from Daher and CORAC will be explored with a project beginning in 2025 with the goal of meeting the OEM’s objective of a go-to-market aircraft plan by 2027. With the real flight testing of Eco-Pulse, the goals are transformed beyond “the paper” according to Robin: “We have now a better idea of what the maturity is of the technological bricks [that] we can put inside an aircraft. We will launch next year a new CORAC project with Safran, in order to work on these hybridization and electrical technologies.

“The idea is to have this assessment of the [technologies’] maturity and to be able to meet the objectives given by my CEO [Didier Kayat],” he concluded. “That’s to propose a design and manufacture aircraft by the end of this strategic plan—so by the end of 2027, we [will be] working on this more electrical aircraft.” Also, Daher’s team will determine what the benefits were of the distributed propulsion system.

We’re certainly excited to see the next project leave the hangar…

November 19, 2024November 19, 2024

The Next Move in Hybrid-Electric Revealed

For my friends catching up, Electra Aero is a very cool aviation start-up that proposes a niche vehicle in the short- to medium-haul regional transport scheme. It ain’t eVTOL… it’s eSTOL, and it uses current airplane and pilot certification bases to achieve a new meaning for short-field takeoffs and landings.

On Wednesday, November 13, Electra Aero in Manassas revealed the EL9 Ultra Short model at its development hangar at KHEF. I was last here for the unveiling of the two-seat technology demonstrator a year and a half ago, and I would not have missed being here for the unveiling we heard announced at NBAA-BACE 24 in Las Vegas last month.

One of the early test models for the Electra series of eSTOL aircraft took a place of honor at the EL9 unveiling. [Credit: Julie Boatman]

The EL-2 technology demonstrator shown alongside the coming 9-seat prototype has been making aviation over Virginia skies (and elsewhere) proving the concept—and resulting in takeoffs and landings of less than 150 feet. That’s critical for launch customers like AFWERX and other military and civilian regional transportation applications.

With a nod to aviation visionary and Electra founder John Langford, CEO B. Marc Allen and SVP JP Stewart talked the audience through the technologies within the future EL9 that leverage the advantages of hybrid-electric motors over purely jet-A driven ones. The EL-2 Goldfinch has been demonstrating these elements for the past year since its first flight in November 2023.

John Langford, founder of Electra, kicks off the reveal of the cabin mockup with Marc Allen. [Credit: Julie Boatman]

Buddy Sessoms, chief engineer from Electra, walked through the flight test program thus far, and the three enabling technologies at its core:

Blown lift
Distributed hybrid-electric power (DEP)
Fly-by-wire (FBW)

The trio come together in a way not possible before—and are anticipated to enter service on the EL9 in 2029, making possible direct travel beyond helicopters, jets, and turboprops. For example, the blown lift enables flight at such low airspeeds to reduce the takeoff and landing distance to that of a typical runway centerline stripe.

Distributed hybrid-electric power, or DEP, has been made possible by the lightweight Safran turbogenerators, designed such that 8 can be placed across the leading edge of the wing. By using a combination of currently available sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) and battery power, the EL9 is projected to leverage the torque of the electric power with the long range and speed made possible by low-to-no-emission SAF.

The Safran TG 600 turbogenerator is under development for the Electra EL9 Ultra Short hybrid-electric airplane. [Credit: Julie Boatman]

And FBW? It orchestrates the blown lift and distributed power into action. “One motor fails, and automatically we shut down the opposing motor,” said Sessoms. “This leaves six remaining motors for safe flight. This is an unprecedented level of automation that is safety focused.” On a typical takeoff, the automated systems currently detect faults with minimal pilot workload. Plus, the pilot actuates this through a single throttle lever to control eight motors in concert, at all times.

“It couldn’t be safer nor simpler,” Sessoms concluded.

The unveiling revealed a full size mockup of the cabin and cargo area… it can be configured either way. Planning for a 34-inch seat pitch and the cabin 60 inches across and 58 inches high.

The full size cabin mockup of the Electra EL9 sat behind the curtain until it was revealed at the end—then opened for the audience to explore. [Credit: Julie Boatman]

We have to wait to see the actual airplane, which will go into production shortly.

So, what are the hurdles? Similar to those of other similar-sized (9-seat single-engine turboprops and light jets come to mind), even the relatively modest amount of electric power needed to make a hybrid system work at this equivalent horsepower still requires management that is quite different from the shielding and distribution currently in use in traditionally powered airplanes.

In any event, the team appears energized to the challenge—and the target niche now occupied by the Cessna Caravan or Daher Kodiak gives plenty of use cases for a real product. We’re looking forward to seeing the EL9 fly into the future with much of technology—and infrastructure—available today.

October 24, 2024October 24, 2024

A Preview of the Garmin G3000 Prime

My third day at NBAA BACE this year kicked off with a visit to our friends at Garmin, who have been basking in the post-release afterglow following the launch of the G3000 Prime flight deck. The avionics giant had an AATD-style sim set up in a conference room at their exhibit in the main hall, and they were gracious enough to give me a thorough demo on their latest product, which combines functionality and style from the G1000 Nxi, G3000, and G3X Touch set-ups.

The launch platform for the G3000 Prime is the Cessna Citation CJ4 Gen3 announced on Monday, but the sim had been set up to be a fairly generic jet—though it bears more than passing resemblance to a 525 series.

New features on the G3000 Prime include the ability to “test out” new routings, diversions, or destinations without loading them into an active flight plan, as well as visualization of arrival sectors. [Credit: Julie Boatman]

In this initial application, the flight deck consists of a three-screen set of large 14-inch primary flight displays (PDUs), and two smaller (7-inch) portrait-oriented secondary displays (or SDUs). But rather than having data entry only available on the SDUs (they are positioned similarly to the touchscreen controllers in the G3000), the pilot can enter data there or directly on the PDU. Fields available for data entry are highlighted, and the pilot can swipe down menus from the top bar to edit those fields directly—I almost applauded when I saw that, thinking back on how frustrating it can be when you get in an airplane and those aren’t to your liking.

The new displays all feature improved touchscreen technology that allows the pilot to brace on the screen itself for input without activating unwanted fields. [Credit: Julie Boatman]

The “touch” itself has improved too, with fingerprint resistant displays and a unique multi-touch tech allowing you to brace your hand directly on the screen for stability while you enter or select the field you want to change or activate. Certain menu buttons (like the Flight Plan) remain available along the bottom of the main displays regardless of what is active on the screen, and the SDUs double as standby electronic flight instruments, with their ability to display PFD and map data in the event of a main screen failure.

A close-up of the Arrival Preview feature in a pop-up window overlaying the main flight plan map, which gives the pilot the ability to use the larger display’s screen real estate without clicking away from the primary map. [Credit: Julie Boatman]

One very cool feature: The pilot can try out a new routing or alternate on the SDU, and generate a visual depiction of it without loading it as an active flight plan. While it has clear safety and situational awareness implications, I also see it as a way to stave off boredom on long legs—you can check out new places to your heart’s delight.

Safety updates abound in the system, beyond emergency Autoland—which has itself seen an upgrade to take NOTAMs into account. One timely feature added is the Runway Occupancy Awareness technology, which analyzes GPS and ADS-B data to determine if the runway ahead has another airplane, or if one is about to land on top of you. I honestly had the heebie-jeebies watching the simulation of it—these are those moments that strike fear in the hearts of pilots.

The Runway Occupancy Awareness feature highlights an active runway in red if the airplane crosses the hold-short line while another airplane occupies it. [Credit: Julie Boatman]

Smart checklists also link to CAS messages, streamlining access to abnormal and emergency procedures with contextual flows. Smart Glide and Smart Rudder Bias come too, along with the Emergency Stability Protection that rounds out Garmin’s Autonomi suite. The Emergency Return function allows you to select a departure alternate close by and set up the runway and landing information ahead of time, so that in the event of a problem that precludes returning to the runway you just left, you already have that locked and loaded.

While it’s still under development in its first application, the G3000 Prime feels fully baked, and I look forward to flying with the system once it’s past certification.

October 23, 2024October 24, 2024

An SFAR Signed at NBAA BACE 2024

The machinations of rulemaking crank through on often mysterious schedules…and we’ve collectively as an industry both suffered and been rewarded as of late with the timeliness of FAA process.

But the stars aligned for NBAA’s team in particular on Tuesday at BACE in Las Vegas, as the FAA released the SFAR (special federal aviation regulation) governing the new powered lift category just in time for administrator Mike Whitaker to sign it into action after his appearance with NBAA president and CEO Ed Bolen at the morning keynote. You could practically hear them popping corks in the D.C. offices all the way to Vegas.

This was the big news I’d alluded to in yesterday’s post. Yes, we have witnessed a milestone in the aviation story.

Mike Whitaker, FAA Administrator, delivers the great news on the SFAR on VTOL aircraft to Ed Bolen, president and CEO of NBAA at BACE 2024 Tuesday morning. [Credit: Julie Boatman]

The SFAR on Powered Lift

The ruling and its amendments outline the parameters for pilot certification, operating rules for powered-lift ops, and give guidance on how those aircraft will integrate into the national airspace system (NAS) with fixed- and rotor-wing aircraft. The rules are performance-based, for the most part, which means they generally tell OEMs and operators the metrics they need to achieve rather than prescribing strictly how they will achieve them.

That’s fantastic news for contenders in the market such as Joby, Archer, Lilium, and others who are well on their way into flight testing conforming (or near-conforming) initial production models, standing up the lines to make them, and building out training and support infrastructure.

JP Stewart and B.Marc Allen deliver the latest updates on the E9 hybrid electric STOL aircraft program at NBAA BACE 2024. [Credit: Julie Boatman]

Electra Aero and eSTOL

But wait… there was more in store yesterday in terms of truly new aircraft program updates. Though their big reveal of the E9 “G0” test article won’t take place til November 13, Electra Aero’s J.P. Stewart and B. Marc Allen walked the media through the progress of the two-seat demonstrator and its test campaign underway in northern Virginia.

As a fan of short takeoff and landing (STOL) airplanes, I love this concept, which uses blown and distributed lift to enable super-slow takeoff and landing speeds, bringing those distances reliably under 150 feet. Stewart reported that they had the airplane down to 22 knots in flight—and they haven’t found the stall speed yet.

Think about that for a second. I can’t wait to witness the 9-seat version flying, likely next year.

Bombardier founder Laurent Beaudoin and chairman Pierre Beaudoin of Bombardier with Lisa Stark receiving the Meritorious Service Award at NBAA BACE. [Credit: Julie Boatman]

Inspiration… in Great Leaders

The other keynotes also touched the SRO audience at the morning session. First, Laurent and Pierre Beaudoin, the father-and-son leaders of Bombardier, received the Meritorious Service Award from NBAA for their dedication to building a benchmark airframe OEM out of a company that manufactured snowmobiles in Quebec in the 1960s.

And Joby’s Bonny Simi—riding a serious high with the SFAR now enabling her to press forward in defining ops and training for the eVTOL OEM—delighted in her conversation with astrophysicist/personality Neil deGrasse Tyson. We all did. Tyson managed to paint with words the picture of his 9-year-old self first seeing the stars inside a planetarium, and feeling so moved that he would make astrophysics his life’s work. I’m putting his book, Astrophysics for People in a Hurry, on my reading list. It’s one of Bonny’s faves, she says. Good enough for me.

The Bombardier Challenger 3500 at NBAA BACE 2024. [Credit: Julie Boatman]

Inspiration… in Great Airplanes

In the afternoon, I made it out to the static display at Henderson airport (KHND), to meet up with Bombardier’s comms team for an introduction to the Challenger 3500. With this update to the legendary CL-30 type, Bombardier has made a workhorse of the corporate fleet into a thoroughbred. I don’t usually turn right upon entering a business jet, but I needed to try out the Nuage seats that line the bright, well-windowed cabin.

But I didn’t get too comfortable, because demo pilot Mark Ohlau had a tour ready for me of the Collins Pro Line 21 Advanced integrated flight deck. I nestled into the left seat behind the significant and traditional leather-covered yoke, and he walked me through the pilot-centered “dark cockpit,” so well organized that it doesn’t need an overhead panel. Ohlau especially likes the MultiScan weather radar, which has enabled his trips all around the globe in the airplane—including a recent bucket-list approach into Paro, Bhutan.

Stay tuned for a full pilot report to come…

The Arrivée Cirrus SF50 Vision Jet on the static display at NBAA BACE 2024. [Credit: Julie Boatman]

I visited other favorite airplanes on the display, in particular the latest Cirrus SR G7 launch edition, and the SF50 Vision Jet Microsoft Flight Sim edition, in honor of its inclusion in the latest release of that software. I also took some time to admire the latest Daher Kodiak 900, the multi-mission APEX version, with a digital camo paint scheme to suit its Swiss-Army-knife capabilities in the field.

Looking forward to my Day Three at the show…prepping for the Climbing.Fast panel with business aviation leaders who champion the sustainability cause. That facet of BACE kicked off Tuesday morning (early…yawn!) with a panel update co-hosted by GAMA.

I get up that early just to see what stylish (and sustainable?) ensemble Embraer’s Michael Amalfitano has pulled together… always check the socks.

The media breakfast on Tuesday championed the Climbing.Fast. program and progress made on various pillars of the push to net-zero emissions by 2025. [Credit: Julie Boatman]

October 22, 2024October 22, 2024

Media Day at NBAA BACE 2024

In times of uncertainty, what do people tend to do? Nothing.

Or perhaps more appropriately, they wait and see. They make incremental changes at most, staying a conservative course until some trigger releases them from this holding pattern.

Though the week will tell if this bears out, that sense of anticipation pervaded on the Monday before opening day of the National Business Aviation Association’s Business Aviation Convention and Exhibition 2024.

“‘I’d say uncertainty is the word right now,” said Rollie Vincent, founder of JetNet, in its annual state of the market briefing on October 21. “Whether it’s geopolitical, whether it’s political, election oriented, whether it’s ‘are we still going to like each other after a certain date on the calendar’…all these sorts of silly things, which aren’t so silly, because they create policy impacts that can drive our industry down, sideways, or in directions we don’t know.”

JetNet hosts the launch of WingX’s Global Insight Professional driving data into a concrete snapshot of business jet activity. [Credit: Julie Boatman]

Textron Aviation Puts Garmin G3000 Prime in CJ4 Gen3

Under the umbrella of that uncertainty, we still have innovation quietly laboring along, with tried-and-true platforms gaining from those evolutionary efforts. The news from Media Day—when the reporting pool and other associates move from press conference to luncheon to reception in hopes of gleaning stories from that access—bore out that observation.

Lannie O’Bannion, SVP of Sales and Flight Ops for TextAV, presents the CJ4 Gen3 model to owner Ryan Samples. [Credit: Julie Boatman]

Textron Aviation announced the latest upgrades to its 2,600-unit fleet of Citation CJs (the 525 series), with the CJ4 Gen3 as launch platform for Garmin’s G3000 Prime all-touch flight deck, complete with emergency Autoland.
Blackhawk Aerospace Group walked through its turboprop-forward portfolio, including enticing ways to improve the very proven King Air 350, Pilatus PC-12, and TBM 700 series, each with a higher-horsepower flavor of the also-proven Pratt & Whitney PT6A.
Bombardier celebrated its NAA speed-record-setting Global 7500, and the progress on the evolution to the “faster, further, smoother” Global 8000, which has topped Mach 1 in flight test. When certified, the 8000 upgrades can be applied to 7500s in the field—keeping that order book solid for sure.
Daher noted the EASA approval of the 5-blade Hartzell prop on the Kodiak 100, as well as its implementation on float-equipped aircraft. The lower rpm (2,000) of the new prop reduces the noise footprint enough (~6.6dBa) to meet European flyover standards.

In the Newsmakers luncheon, NBAA president and CEO Ed Bolen brings together partners from across the aisle, Sam Graves and Rick Larsen to celebrate the passage of the FAA Reauthorization Bill. [Credit: Julie Boatman]

FAA Reauthorization Celebrated Too

At the Newsmakers Lunch, NBAA president and CEO Ed Bolen hosted congressmen Sam Graves (R-Mo.) and Rick Larsen (D-Wash.), partners on the Transportation and Infrastructure Subcommittee as chair and ranking member, in a recap of the FAA Authorization Bill and all of the wins tucked inside of it. There should be no uncertainty here… the bill passed with very little opposition. “I feel strong that we have the basis, regardless of which administration is the place, to say we’re very clear about what we want to get done,” said Larsen. “And so, it’s a matter of implementation. It’s not a matter of ‘do you want to do it or not do it?’ You do it—we made that clear.”

And while we’re waiting for the door to crack open on bigger news this week at the show, at least we have that message in place regardless of the election’s outcome next month. And maybe there is more to each of these nuggets of progress to discover—we’ll be diving into each one more deeply in the coming weeks.

A quiet space can be found in Vegas. [Credit: Julie Boatman]

October 20, 2024October 21, 2024

What Moose Means to Me

The opportunity to finish what we started—and witness the power of nature’s hand in forest renewal—compelled me to return to 1U1.

Stories have led me to enchanting places, but few resonate deep within me like the Idaho backcountry.

Our commitment to the Recreational Aviation Foundation and its mission to preserve access to wild, wonderful airstrips we treasure led us to return to Moose Creek USFS (1U1) in the Selway Bitterroot Wilderness in early October by Daher Kodiak 100. This time around, having the freedom to share my personal connection to the mission is a gift—pure gold like the aspens turning and shivering in the breeze. We flew in on a Friday, with plans to work through the weekend, rebuilding fence and joining fellow pilots and enthusiasts in the camaraderie such effort engenders.

Moose Creek Airstrip approaching from the northeast. [Credit: Julie Boatman]

My 7-year-old self carried a little backpack on our family trip to Glacier National Park in the late 70s, just a short flight north of where we’re bunking down for the night. So it feels like returning home, snuggling into a sleeping bag in the loaner tent we put up hours before—at little or no risk to our marriage. It was perfectly chilly on Friday night, just below freezing but enough to keep my beanie on through ’til morning. From a tent at Oshkosh this year to this place… two of the happiest places on earth to me. But in honesty, the more perfect one is this, miles and miles from any road. The silence of the pillaring pines covers us like a blanket until the wind filters through them. So many snapped off at the shoulders from a violent yet brief windstorm, a microburst that hit on July 25 after the Moose Creek Complex fires of ’24 raged through, led by the Wye Fire in late July.

The Moose we knew last October—when we put up the first tranche of fence—has been left shaken by the impact but repairable by both human and invisible hands. Power tools had been called in to assist: The special dispensation to use chainsaws to break down the massive trunks left akimbo after the storms speaks to the size of that task. To do so with the hand saws normally allowed by the Wilderness Act would take years.

The forest will regenerate on its own terms and timeline. It always does. It needs the fire and the wind and the deep snows to renew itself.

We flew in Daher’s serial number one Kodiak last year—the same one that made the model’s first flight 20 years ago—on October 16, 2004, and not far from this place. That was N490KQ, which continues to fly under experimental status. It’s in flight test on Aerocet floats at the time of this writing, in fact. This year we met Bob Miller at KMSO in N504KQ, another Daher-donated critical airlift provider. The short flight over bumped us around a fair bit at 8,500…but as promised after we descended below the ridgelines it smoothed out completely. The winds aloft hadn’t made it down yet, thankfully. However, a front would power through later that evening, raining on us briefly with a twist of wind swirling around the treetops. Fred the cook accelerated our dinner plans so we didn’t get caught out.

Telling tales around a campfire is one of the top reasons why we gather in these places. [Credit: Julie Boatman]

The campfire around Bill’s Solo stove waited ’til Saturday night, which stayed calm and cool with a billion stars above us streaking across the Milky Way. By that time, we’d completed the rest of the fence surrounding the pasture—courtesy of another load brought in by Kodiak in the clutch. We were short 36 cross-bucks in the original materials flown and hauled in earlier, so the turboprop-that-could was dispatched to Missoula Saturday morning to pick up more.

After delivering the needed cross-bucks, the Kodiak is unloaded by RAF volunteers. [Credit: Julie Boatman]

The infusion of lumber meant the world to us on the work crew—to leave the fence just a dozen yards short would have triggered compulsive feelings of incompletion for an agonizingly long time. And it meant a lot to the agencies participating in this particular project—the U.S. Forest Service, certainly, but also the Montana Conservation Corps and the Selway Bitterroot Frank Church Foundation (SBFC).

Two outhouses also burned in the August blaze… so the materials brought in included a pair of IKEA-style latrine kits—and Craig, who was the expert on putting them together. Within a day, we had two fully functional outhouses painted in Oxford Brown down at the southern end of the runways, in the “triangle.”

Two new outhouses replaced the ones burned in the fires at Moose Creek in 2024. [Credit: Julie Boatman]

Our meals shared around the picnic tables in front of the cookhouse expanded to fit the ~60 folks who showed up in more than 40 airplanes. Mealtime also gave us two special canine companions, Roux and Tate, who followed the enticing aromas of barbecue over from an outfitter’s campsite on the north edge of the complex.

No one could know how my heart clenched in a fist as Tate cautiously came up under my hand for a scratch behind his ears and a bid for food—he looked so much like Eddy, the pup we lost tragically to an accident in May, who possessed similarly soulful eyes. Every nibble of pulled pork, every flipped potato chip—he caught them along with the spirit of the crazy sweet dog we miss every day. Throughout this past sorrowful summer, hikes on the Appalachian Trail and marathon training runs had worked to heal my heart somewhat…but I really needed the mountains to swallow up the gaping hollowness inside me. I got my mountains twice this season—Colorado at the end of August, and the October week in Montana and Idaho. The honest work, lifting logs to my shoulders to portage like a canoe, back and forth, powered by Trish McKenna’s cookies, begun healing me in other places as well. Grief isn’t linear; it comes in waves. Tears mix well with sweat; they have a similar saline composition.

Stephen gives a treat to Tate, one of the camp canines of the trip, and dear to us. [Credit: Julie Boatman]

Speaking of flowing water, Stephen and I hiked down to the confluence of the Selway and Moose Creek on Sunday morning, to witness more of the fire’s effect and record in photos this passing of time and memory. Any time we can scramble around rocks, we’re content, and the rounded river pebbles we felt under our feet will outlast us all.

The RAF crew finished this project ahead of schedule—many hands making light work indeed—and so we flew out a day earlier than planned. Bob Wells came to fetch us, again in N504KQ, and though we didn’t have the Missoula Tower making mother-in-law jokes on that segment, the flight was seasoned with the smoke from the Sheridan Fire blowing up from Wyoming.

As the last of the leaves fall, I know someday we’ll return to 1U1, though other projects and other places beckon. But there’s a bond I feel with “Moose” that will go on as long as I do.

September 27, 2024September 29, 2024

Seeing the Future on the PCH

Driving back from the Santa Monica Airport to my friend’s house in Agoura Hills, I have the option of going the coastal route, skipping the 101 and its traffic vagaries and headaches.

The Pacific Coast Highway up to Malibu, with a turnoff right at Pepperdine (Waves!!) snuggles me in like a old pair of yoga pants as I join the parade past the beaches to the left and the Palisades rising to the right.

Just past the turnoff to the Bay Inn, a motion above the water ahead catches my eye. I think it’s a helicopter—those fly by regularly on this stretch of SoCal—but I register with a start that it could have been the Joby demonstrator, “N54LAX,” that had been on display all day at KSMO, in honor of Donald Douglas Day.

Had I just witnessed a milestone in history? Not quite. But I saw our future.

In a conversation with Joby founder JoeBen Bevirt last year, his tone and his passion as he related his desire to innovate point-to-point transport into a whisper-quiet, zero-emissions occurrence touched me. It came back in waves—yes—as I slowed and stopped at the next light, considering my trip up the coast versus the joyful flight those members of the Joby team would have enjoyed on their sightseeing cruise. While the 228-nm flight back home to Marina wasn’t in the cards—but could it be, at this moment in time, completed directly by airplane or helicopter—or eVTOL? In near silence, at dollars per hour instead of thousands?

Well, here we are. That future is imminent.

What a fitting close to Donald Douglas Day, celebrating a man who brought commercial air transport to the masses with the Douglas DC-3, nearly 90 years ago.

He would have *loved* the Joby, Archer, Pivotal, Pipistrel, and Airhart displays at Santa Monica on “his” day.