The OC Metro Minute – a daily video cast of business news for Orange County highlighted FlyMiwok operator New Vectors Aviation this morning. The program also discussed Forbe’s editor Rich Karlgaard’s positive message for businesses which were launched during a recession. Rich has also recently issued a positive statement about on-demand air-travel as a growth market this year.

Valentine’s Day is just around the corner, and if you’re still looking for ideas for that certain someone, we can help you out through our partnership with New Vectors Aviation.

We now offer the perfect romantic getaway to your favorite destination – be it Las Vegas, Napa, Vail or any other destination in the US you or your sweetheart desires. We will take care of everything through FlyMiwok Concierge Service:

- A professional limo service to and from the airplane

- Flowers, chocolates and champagne on board the aircraft

- Dinner and hotel reservations if needed

Call us now at 949.200.7412 to book your romantic valentine’s day experience!

Call us now for special Valentine’s day deals.. We look forward to serving you on this very special day.

Sincerely,

Gad Barnea

FlyMiwok, Inc.

Automatic Dependent Surveillance – Broadcast (a.k.a ADS-B) has move forward towards broad-based adoption recently with the adoption of minimum operational performance standards (MOPS) by the standards body RTCA.

ADS-B is basically a way to broadcast positioning information received through GPS (GNSS) among aircraft and ground stations equipped with the proper equipment. This is a great and inexpensive substitute for radar which has ruled our airspace for decades and suffers from signal degradation due to range, atmospheric conditions, altitude, etc. Radar is also prone to mechanical problems and issues stemming from rotational speed parameters. In short, radar has been a great tool for many years, but its time has come.

This improved positioning information will make navigation safer and more accurate and will help separate aircraft better and – very importantly – will allow for air traffic control (ATC) support in areas where radar services are unavailable such as in parts of the Western US.

An article in Aviation Week yesterday discusses the latest advances in detail. ADS-B actually became operational in October with initial operational capability in the Gulf of Mexico this month. Juneau, AK will follow in April 2010.

This phase only covers ADS-B “out” but the main benefit of ADS-B will come from the adoption of ADS-B “in” at a later date. ADS-B “out” refers to an aircrafts ability to send transmission, but not receive them. ADS-B “in” (which requires “out” capabilities to operate) allows aircraft to receive and interpret transmission and complete the broadcast cycle.

This is a big step in making our airspace safer and more efficient and a building block for even more exciting services to be built on top of this new infrastructure.

End 2009 with a romantic trip to Las Vegas!

Let us take you and your significant other on a romantic getaway to Las Vegas! We’ll take care of everything..

A Unique Las Vegas Experience!
This package is not for everyone. But then, you are not everyone..

We have designed a romantic package that takes care of your total travel experience.

This $2009 (one way) special package includes:
- A night flight from anywhere in our service area in Southern California to Las Vegas.

- Top-rated limo service from your home to the airplane, where the pilot will greet you.

- Champagne and chocolate to enjoy on board the aircraft or take with you.

- Top-rated limo service from the airplane to the hotel of your choice (hotel not included)

- Views of Las Vegas at night from the air… 

Flights are flown in a luxurious Cirrus SR-22 aircraft with state-of-the-art safety and technology features and breathtaking visibility to make this a flight both of you will never forget..

You can purchase this package one way or add romance to your return trip home as well for just an additional $1750.

Prices are all inclusive.

We are also here to help with any special requests you may have. Think of us as your secret concierge here to help you close out 2009 in romance.
So call us now at (949) 200-7412! Your romantic getaway is waiting..

• All flights operated by New Vectors Aviation

Feel free to contact us with any questions you may have. Call us at (949) 200-7412

Sincerely,

Your Friends at FlyMiwok, Inc.

Ghosts, ghouls and goblins are everywhere this weekend, but you can be on your way to your favorite SoCal destination high above the congested highways and saving hours of precious time.

For this haunted weekend, we offer you $100 off of any flight you book.

Treat yourself today – call us now at (949) 200-7412 to book your flight!

• All flights operated by New Vectors Aviation

Sincerely,

Gad Barnea – CEO – FlyMiwok, Inc.

During the last 100 years, we have seen a number of interesting aircraft designs; one of the most impressive ever built was certainly the Dornier DoX.

Initially, critics claimed that an airplane this big could never get off the ground. Dornier proved them wrong 80 years ago, when on October 21, 1929, they packed 159 employees and a crew of 10 into the plane and took off from Lake Constance for a 60 minute flight around Bregenz, Lindau and other cities along the shores of the lake. While they did not really intend to do so, they set a record of transporting the largest number of passengers ever to this date – a record that was not broken for close to 20 years.

The plane was huge – it needed 12 engines with a combined 6300 hp to lift its 50 tons of weight out of the water. While a huge leap in technology, it proved too maintenance-prone and ultimately too costly to operate. Thus, during its initial 2 year marketing trip around the world, it could not attract any civilian buyers – the Great Depression certainly did not help Dornier, either. They managed to sell two planes to the Italian Air Force, but these were grounded in 1935. Similarly, the German Air Force got rid of their only plane at around the same time after it crashed and was severly damaged while landing on a lake near the German-Austrian border.

All that is left today of the three Do X planes are pictures – some of them can be seen at the German magazine Der Spiegel.

Over the last decades, many airlines have gone under. But rarely has one ever been shut down because the federal entity governing it went away. Such was the case with Interflug (formerly Lufthansa East), the East German state-owned airline, which was shut down when East and West Germany unified 19 years ago.

In a case like this, what happens to the planes and the airline personnel? The German magazine “Der Spiegel” has an interesting piece on the demise of Interflug. In the case of pilots and other personnel, they got either transferred to Lufthansa or found new jobs, some of them as far away as in Taiwan.

The situation was different with regards to aircraft. The German government only kept the 3 new Airbus planes that Interflug had. All of the older aircraft, mainly Tupolevs and Ilyushins, were either sold or scrapped. A number of IL-62’s, IL-18’s and TU-134’s are still in use in Russia, Asia, Africa and Australia. Some of the scrapped aircraft are used for training purposes, mainly by local firefighters that are stationed at various airports in the eastern part of Germany. Others are in aircraft museums and one IL-14P (pictured above), which was converted into a restaurant, is now parked next to a car dealership in Cämmerswalde.

About 3 miles to the East of Compton Airport, you can find the Dominguez Ranch Adobe a.k.a Rancho San Pedro) – a beautiful historic building – now a museum.

The first flight west of the Rockies – ever – was flown here at 1pm on Jan 10th 1910 by Glenn Curtiss.

“At one o’clock a yellow winged Curtiss biplane was rolled to the starting point in front of the grandstand and the crowd became silent as they realized that the action was about to start. Glenn Curtiss indicated he was ready to start and the area was cleared by the field deputies. A mechanic swung the propeller and the engine started with a roar. As the machine began to roll a cheer went up from the crowd, which changed to an amazed silence as it rose from the ground and sailed gracefully around the course at a height of 50 feet. After 1 minute and 28 seconds in the air, covering a distance of 5/8 of a mile, Curtiss landed easily and rolled to a stop within 300 feet of the starting point. This was the first successful powered airplane flight made in the west. The skeptics were convinced an airplane could fly and the crowd was satisfied their time was well spent.”

[From the book, "The Dominguez Air Meet" by D.D. Hatfield.]

The 1910 Air Meet was the 2nd aviation gathering in history and the 1st in the US, an event that lasted for 10 days from Jan 10th to the 20th.

The longest cross country flight ever made – in the world at that time – was flown here by French aviator Louis Paulhan.

The flight was promoted as: 

“Paulhan will fly to Baldwin’s Ranch (LA Arboretum) [ Pasadena, CA – Ed. ] and return, 45 miles. Back in one hour“.

This still is faster than driving 45 miles in Los Angeles almost 100 years later..

Louis Paulhan taking off at the 1910 Air Meet

“Running straight before the wind on the ‘home stretch’, it was before the grandstand that I was traveling at not less than sixty miles per hour, and at no other exhibition in the world, so far as I know, has such a speed been attained where thousands of people could witness it. Sixty miles per hour is about as fast as a man wants to travel by any method of locomotion.”

[From the book, "The Dominguez Air Meet" by D.D. Hatfield.]

Yesterday’s fatal mid-air collision between a tour helicopter carrying 5 and a PA-32 single engine Piper carrying 3 people over the Hudson is a painful reminder of just how critical it is to “see-and-avoid” in flight. Our thoughts and prayers are with the families of the victims of this tragic event.

We’re not judging any of the pilots actions and of course it will be up to the NTSB to determine exactly what happened. But it is important to point out a couple of things. This VFR corridor sees tens of thousands of VFR flights every year and generally has an extremely good track record of safety. It also is “self-managed” meaning that pilots do their own “air-traffic control” on a common frequency – and it works. However, there are a couple of technologies in use that could have potentially helped avoid the disaster:

- A TCAS-type (Traffic Collision Avoidance System) device that shows the pilot real-time traffic information and alerts the pilot when another aircraft gets too close. Airliners use these systems and many General-Aviation aircraft use them too – such as the Cirrus SR-22 which comes standard with this system.

- The PA-32 lost its right wing in the collision. Usually that leaves the pilot with zero options. However, in Cirrus aircraft (and more and more aircraft are also following suit), there’s a parachute that can be deployed in this kind of situation to gently lower the airplane back to earth – assuming that there’s enough altitude (the parachute was demostrated to be effective with less than 400ft. of altitude loss), speed is within limits (133 knots) and assuming the pilot, or anyone else in the aircraft was still conscious after the collision, of course – and briefed on how to deploy the ‘chute.

This is what a parachute deployment in a Cirrus looks like:

A pilot’s eyes looking out for traffic are still the best “see-and-avoid” technology we have, but the technology is there – and is constantly getting better – to help avoid the kind of unfortunate collision we saw yesterday.