Mini-jets prepare to soar

NEW YORK - The age of tiny jet planes is drawing near and with it the prospect - for the travelling public's upper crust - of avoiding delays, long lines, lost bags, over-booked flights and the other hassles of big airports.

On December 31, less than 12 hours before New Year's, test pilots at the controls of a prototype of the six-seat Eclipse 500 lifted off from Albuquerque International Sunport, put the plane through its paces for 89 minutes and landed safely.

The 500's successful test flight with United Technologies' Pratt & Whitney engines helped buttress the credibility of Vern Raburn, 54, chief executive of Eclipse Aviation, who had vowed to undertake a test flight of the new plane by the end of the year.

Eclipse investors, aviation experts and customers, were eager to see if the new engines performed as expected.

"It was just the way you want a test like that to go, totally uneventful," said Raburn. "The test told us our assumptions were good. No surprises."

In 2002 the Eclipse project suffered a serious setback when it fired its previous engine maker, Williams International, due to unspecified shortcomings. Raburn, a former Microsoft executive (the 18th person to join the software maker), promised to find a new engine maker, and certify the 500 for commercial operation in early 2006.

Eclipse spokesman Andrew Broom said the company had 2200 orders for the plane in hand, including customer deposits. The plane costs about US$1.2 million ($1.71 million), up from the initial price of less than US$1 million.

"I'm seeing an aeroplane that's going to break the mold," said Fred George, senior editor of Business & Commercial Aviation magazine, who watched the test flight from a chase plane.

Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates and former Ford Motor chairman Harold Poling are among those who have invested $326 million in Eclipse, whose borrowings are now about $70 million.

The concept is to manufacture a small, light and relatively inexpensive jet plane that needs only a single pilot and can serve as an air taxi to more than 10,000 airports around the country. Commercial aircraft, which typically need longer runways, now serve about 600 airports.

The Eclipse 500's range, depending on conditions, could be about 2250km at a cruising speed of 640km/h. Given its relatively low operating costs, Broom estimated, a one-way flight to Santa Fe, New Mexico, from Detroit might be priced at about US$2500.

Split this among four or five passengers and add the convenience factor and corporations or those now buying first-class or business-class tickets might see the value, especially since some air taxi flights could cut travel time drastically, given long drives and delays at metropolitan airports.

Initially, taxi services probably would operate small jets with two pilots, Raburn said. Eventually, when travellers get used to the idea, companies might switch to one pilot, reducing costs and adding an extra passenger seat.

Raburn believes an extensive market of private and corporate aircraft exists that will be replaced by Eclipse's 500 and similar models in development.

"We'll be able to go to places the airlines don't go, to many small towns that don't have service," he said. "We won't be taking customers from airlines, we'll be taking them off the highways."

Textron Inc's Cessna division said it expects to conduct its first test flight of the Citation Mustang small jet plane this year, with certification possible in 2006.

The six-seat Mustang also will be powered by Pratt & Whitney engines.

Pratt & Whitney is the world's third-largest builder of jet engines, behind General Electric and Rolls-Royce.

"The Mustang is just like ours, except twice as much money," Raburn said. "But Cessna has been around for a while, so we'll give them some credit for the strength of the brand."

Several smaller aircraft companies also have announced plans to sell small jet planes.

Raburn said he thinks that Empresa Brasileira de Aeronautica of Brazil might build a small jet as well.

Much remains to be seen about whether small airlines or taxi services can operate these aircraft profitably, whether travellers will pay the price and whether the new class of jet planes proves to be as safe and popular as conventional corporate aircraft.

The latest test flights of the Eclipse - 10 so far - are very promising. Not just to harried travellers and aviation buffs, but also to the Eclipse investors.

Raburn confirms that a public offering of Eclipse stock is likely "within a few years".

- BLOOMBERG