June Business Aircraft activity stays positive

June Business Aircraft activity stays positive

ARGUS reports that June 2011 flight activity stays positive with a slight increase over May 2011. TRAQPak data indicates that June 2011 business aircraft activity was up 0.4% over May 2011.

Looking at the results for operational categories, the Part 135 and Part 91 segments both posted a positive month, up 1.6% and 0.2% accordingly. The fractional segment was the only operational category to post a drop, down 1.5% from last month. Reviewing aircraft categories, only turboprops managed stay positive from the previous month, up 4.2%. On the downside, small, mid-size, and large cabin aircraft all posted a month over month decline, down 2.6%, 1.4%, and 3.1% respectively. Looking at individual market segments, the Part 135 turboprop market showed the largest month over month increase, up 5.6%. full details

ARGUS TRAQPak data is serial-number specific aircraft arrival and departure information on all IFR flights in the US (including Alaska and Hawaii). The tables below reflect business aircraft activity data for June 1-30, 2011 vs. May 1-31, 2011 and June 1-30, 2011 vs. June 1-30, 2010 respectively. Note: Part 135 charter certificate flight activity reflects flights of aircraft on Part 135 charter certificates irrespective of the mission type.

 Comparing year over year results (June 2011 vs. June 2010) aircraft activity increased by 1.1% overall. The Part 91 and fractional markets continue to see positive year over year growth with both seeing their activity levels increase at 3.4% and 8.7% respectively. The Part 135 market continues to post a decline from the previous year’s activity, down 5.6%. Aircraft category results were mainly positive, with large cabin leading the way again, up 8.1%. The mid-size and small cabin segments followed with increases of 6.4% and 0.6% accordingly. Looking at individual market segments, the fractional, mid-size cabin segment saw the largest gain with an increase of 12.8%; the Part 135 turboprop segment had the largest decline in flights, down 10.3% year over year.

Business Blog » Looming defense cuts bring return of familiar ...

Last Tuesday’s deal to slash defense spending by hundreds of billions as part of the deal to raise the nation’s debt ceiling set off the kind of anxiousness not felt in Columbus since the Base Realignment & Closure commission shut down a half-dozen years ago.

Suddenly, the Golden Triangle’s continued economic resurgence is not as sure a thing as it was just a few weeks ago. If the Air Force needs fewer aircraft it won’t need as many new pilots. And Columbus Air Force Base, a flight training installation and biggest employer in Columbus, is in the business of producing pilots.

It all makes Joe Max Higgins, director of The Link, a Columbus-Lowndes County business support group, uneasy. “In our office today we’ve had one or two conversations,” he said. “Yes, the topic is already being discussed. What we’re doing here they are doing in Brookhaven. Somebody is talking about it in Vicksburg.”

Wages paid to civilian workers at the air base “probably beats our top three to four manufactures here,” Higgins said. “It’s our biggest generator of wealth.”

Columbus AFB had 1,494 military personnel assigned to it in 2009 and 1,777 civilian employees, producing an annual economic impact estimated at $287 million.

Since 1970, the 5,000-acre installation has trained one-third of the Air Force’s new pilots, or about 300 each year. Its training mission is shared by two other installations: Laughlin AFB in Del Rio, Texas, and Vance AFB in Enid, Okla.

The agreement reached last Tuesday between Congress and President Obama specifies an estimated $350 billion in cuts for the Armed Forces in what lawmakers are calling Round One. Round Two is likely to see automatic cuts of $500 billion in the second round later this year. The only way automatic cuts in the Pentagon budgets won’t be triggered is through a congressional “Super Committee” of six Democrats and six Republican lawmakers agreeing to specific cuts of $1.2 trillion later this year. Debt ceiling negotiations that went down to the midnight hour give no reason to believe the two can come up with a mutual plan.

With the 2005 Base Realignment & Closure commission recommendations, Congress took an up-or-down vote on the installations to be closed. An up-or-down vote is also contemplated for the Pentagon cuts that would be triggered by an impasse of the “Super Committee” this fall.

Military spending in Mississippi came to $4.98 billion in 2009, of which the Navy accounted for $2.66 billion, the Army $1.17 billion, the Air Force $146 million and the Army Corps of Engineers and miscellaneous activities $207 million, according to the Consolidated Federal Funds Report for Fiscal 2009.

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