{"id":1580,"date":"2016-07-28T16:22:21","date_gmt":"2016-07-28T21:22:21","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/planesintheair.com\/?p=1580"},"modified":"2016-07-28T16:22:21","modified_gmt":"2016-07-28T21:22:21","slug":"eclipse-aerospace","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/planesintheair.com\/?p=1580","title":{"rendered":"Eclipse Aerospace in Albuquerque, New Mexico"},"content":{"rendered":"

Eclipse Aerospace<\/strong>, part of ONE Aviation, is\u00a0headquartered in Albuquerque, New Mexico. Eclipse Aviation was one of the initial players in the “Very Light Jet” movement that began with the company’s startup in 1998\u00a0by former\u00a0Microsoft\u00a0member Vern Raburn. With Bill Gates a major stockholder, the company began its life in\u00a0Scottsdale, Arizona, but soon moved to Albuquerque following\u00a0investments\u00a0by the State of\u00a0New Mexico\u00a0and the City of\u00a0Albuquerque in 2000. The company’s sole product was the\u00a0Eclipse 500 jet, with the first prototype flying on\u00a0August 26, 2002.\u00a0The Eclipse 500 jet was designed with two Williams International\u00a0EJ22 turbofan engines, but after just 1 flight, the company made the decision to switch engines to the\u00a0Pratt & Whitney Canada\u00a0PW610F-A turbofan. The engine\u00a0change meant that a major airframe redesign would be required, and\u00a0caused a program delay of about thirty\u00a0months. The Eclipse 500 jet was\u00a0certified\u00a0by the FAA on\u00a0September 30, 2006. The\u00a0first customer delivery occurring\u00a0in\u00a0January of 2007. Following\u00a0issues with\u00a0some suppliers,\u00a0Eclipse Aviation’s\u00a0largest customer\u00a0DayJet ceased operations\u00a0on\u00a0September 19, 2008. Financial reasons\u00a0was stated\u00a0as the cause of the DayJet\u00a0shutdown.\u00a0Eclipse halted production of\u00a0its 500 jet in October of 2008 at serial number 267. Eclipse Aviation filed for\u00a0Chapter 11 bankruptcy\u00a0protection in November of 2008. However, that would not be the end of Eclipse.<\/p>\n

Eclipse Aerospace has a rebirth<\/b><\/p>\n

August of 2009 saw a new group called\u00a0Eclipse Aerospace, which was lead by by Mike Press and Mason Holland,\u00a0as the single Chapter 7 bankruptcy\u00a0sale\u00a0bidder for the assets of Eclipse Aviation. With the new group and its\u00a015 employees moving back into the\u00a0old Eclipse facilities in Albuquerque in September of 2009, it was time to bring the Eclipse Jet program back to life.\u00a0In October of 2009, the company made its first offering, an upgraded\u00a0avionics and de-icing package\u00a0available\u00a0for existing Eclipse 500 aircraft. In\u00a0December of 2009, the new Eclipse Aerospace was installing their upgrades on\u00a028 former DayJet planes acquired in the bankruptcy auction, in addition to eight planes being upgraded for existing customers.\u00a0October of 2010 saw Sikorsky Aircraft investing in Eclipse Aerospace, as the company’s President Jeff Pino owned an Eclipse 500 jet. The deal was finalized in January of 2011, with Sikorsky providing\u00a0Eclipse with access to its supply and parts distribution chain. In October 2011, Eclipse Aerospace announced it would begin production of an improved version of the Eclipse 500 jet. It would be\u00a0called the\u00a0Eclipse 550, with first delivery expected in 2013.\u00a0The first new Eclipse 550\u00a0rolled out in March of 2013, with the first customer delivery coming in October of 2013.<\/p>\n

On\u00a0April 15 of 2015, it was announced that Eclipse Aerospace\u00a0and\u00a0Kestrel Aircraft would merge to create\u00a0One Aviation Corporation.\u00a0Alan Klapmeier was named as the first CEO of One Aviation. Alan was previously the CEO\u00a0of Kestrel,\u00a0as well as Cirrus Aircraft.\u00a0The combined company will continue to produce the\u00a0Eclipse 550,\u00a0and will complete development and certification\u00a0of the new Kestrel K-350 aircraft. The Kestrel 350 will be an all\u00a0composite, single\u00a0engine\u00a0turboprop aircraft, and will carry up to 8 people at high speed to places that jets simply cannot access. It will be\u00a0more versatile, burn less fuel, and be capable of maintaining safe approach speeds at large busy airports, as well as shorter\u00a0grass or gravel runways. The\u00a0Kestrel 350 is still\u00a0in development,\u00a0and is being billed as an exceptionally easy plane to fly\u00a0with superior handling characteristics and responsiveness, even at low speeds. It’s spec’ed to climb efficiently at more than 2,250 feet per\u00a0minute to a maximum altitude of 31,000 feet, with a cruise speed of greater than 320 knots. It was a very impressive tour that I received, and I would like to thank Ken Oden for taking the time to speak with me, and show me around the Albuquerque facility!<\/p>\n

\"Eclipse<\/p>\n

Image from\u00a0www.oneaviation.aero<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Eclipse Aerospace, part of ONE Aviation, is\u00a0headquartered in Albuquerque, New Mexico. Eclipse Aviation was one of the initial players in the “Very Light Jet” movement that began with the company’s startup in 1998\u00a0by former\u00a0Microsoft\u00a0member Vern Raburn. With Bill Gates a major stockholder, the company began its life in\u00a0Scottsdale, Arizona, but soon moved to Albuquerque following\u00a0investments\u00a0by […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[89],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1580","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-aviation-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/planesintheair.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1580","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/planesintheair.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/planesintheair.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/planesintheair.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/planesintheair.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1580"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/planesintheair.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1580\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1584,"href":"https:\/\/planesintheair.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1580\/revisions\/1584"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/planesintheair.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1580"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/planesintheair.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1580"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/planesintheair.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1580"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}