baja rooster - 5-3-2004 at 08:50 PM
Airplane Sales Up (Economy Is Up?) ... Finally
GAMA Figures Indicate Recovery...
Finally, there's some evidence the long-anticipated (and, perhaps, optimistically forecast) recovery in the aviation industry may have begun. The
General Aviation Manufacturers Association's (GAMA's) first-quarter delivery and billing stats show healthy increases on both sides of the ledger for
the full range of GA aircraft. Some cautious observers may be quick to point out that figures for last year were so deeply in the tank that these
hopeful signs should be put in perspective. However, improvement is improvement and GAMA's figures do point to an overall 21.1-percent increase in
billings and 9.7-percent increase in shipments over the first quarter of 2003. Perhaps the most significant figure in the report is the jump in bizjet
sales. They went up to 115 from 101 (13.9 percent) worldwide, perhaps suggesting that corporations are loosening the purse strings in anticipation of
a general economic recovery. Piston sales, which were the only bright spot in the 2003 figures, maintained a reasonable growth rate with an increase
of 9.1 percent to 394 shipments (only six were twins) in the first quarter of 2004, from 361 in the first three months of 2003. Turboprop sales
increased by just one delivery from 31 to 32 (3.2 percent).
...Tax Breaks Vital To Recovery...
The perspective granted by recent history may offer a glimpse at just how "recovery" is relative. Compare Friday's figures with those of the first
quarter of 2001 and you might want to put away the champagne in favor of a shot of scotch. The recent improvement compares with overall sales from the
early 2001 boom by reaching a point that's 15.8 percent lower. There were 642 sales in the first quarter of 2001 compared to 541 in the same period in
2004, and billings are off by 35 percent (currently $2.38 billion vs. $3.64 billion in 2001). As tenuous as the good news is, GAMA President Ed Bolen
said he hopes Congress will play a big role in maintaining the current momentum by renewing a key tax incentive. Bonus depreciation, in which buyers
of big-ticket items (like airplanes) for business are allowed to more quickly depreciate the purchase and claim a big first-year tax break, has acted
like a government-sponsored discount program for the industry -- but it only applies to goods put in service before Jan. 1, 2005. GAMA wants the
government to extend the placed-in-service deadline for aircraft because they take so much longer to build than many other items. "We need Congress to
quickly extend bonus depreciation to ensure we keep this momentum going through the end of the year and into 2005," Bolen said.
...Controllers See The Trend
Another way to gauge recovery (albeit unscientifically) is by the number of aircraft in the air. AVweb columnist Don Brown works at Atlanta Center
(ZTL) and he says record-high traffic has caught everyone's attention there. "As far as the controllers at Atlanta Center can tell, the recovery is
already here," Brown told AVweb. He said it's not uncommon for special events in the Southeast (like The Masters and Sun 'n Fun) to push the traffic
count to around 10,000 operations per day. But on an ordinary weekday in late April, the count hit 10,175. "I believe it to be the first time ZTL
broke 10,000 operations in one day without a special event occurring in our airspace," Brown said. Brown, who is the ZTL safety representative for the
National Association of Air Traffic Controllers, said a report is being prepared on the record-setting day to assess staffing levels. In the meantime,
with the summer travel season approaching, there doesn't seem like there's anywhere for those figures to go but up. Stay tuned ...