Summary: Freelance aviation journalist Jason Rabinowitz joins us to talk about FAA deadlines, passenger behaviour on charter flights, and the state of U.S. airport infrastructure. Also, the best aviation museums, Jetblue’s new FlyFi system, travel technology, and analyzing travel data. Jason is @AirlineFlyer on Twitter and also see his Facebook page. Find Jason’s writing at Airchive, AirlineReporter, and the Runway Girl Network. The week’s aviation news: FAA Likely To Miss Deadlines on NextGen, UAS and PBN Is Bieber getting out of control? Joe Biden Says NYC Airport Like ‘Some 3rd-World Country’ From CNN, the World’s 14 best aviation museums: 14. Palm Springs Air Museum (California, United States) 13. Central Museum of the Air Forces (Monino, Russia) 12. Royal Flying Doctor Service Museum (Alice Springs, Australia) 11. Red Bull Hangar-7 (Salzburg, Austria) 10. Canada Aviation and Space Museum (Ottawa, Canada) 9. China Aviation Museum (Beijing) 8. Polish Aviation Museum (Krakow, Poland) 7. Pima Air & Space Museum (Arizona, United States) 6. State Aviation Museum of Ukraine (Kiev, Ukraine) 5. French Air and Space Museum (Le Bourget, France) – Jason 4. Future of Flight Aviation Center and Boeing Tour (Washington, United States) 3. National Museum of the United States Air Force (Ohio, United States) 2. Imperial War Museum Duxford (Duxford, UK) 1. Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum (Washington, D.C.) David Vanderhoof’s segment: Suzie the Cirrus and her adventure with Mr. Alex. In this week’s Australia Desk: This week we have a recent interview with Matt Hall, talking about his preparations for the upcoming Red Bull Air Race season. For US listeners, there are two races this year – one in Forth Worth and the other in Las Vegas. Find more from Grant and Steve at the Plane Crazy Down Under podcast, and follow the show on Twitter at @pcdu. Steve’s at @stevevisscher and Grant at @falcon124. In this week’s Across the Pond segment: Pieter talks to Krzysztof Kuska Editor-in-Chief of Infolotnicze about the decision by the Polish military to proceed with buying the Alenia Aermacchi M-346 twin-engined jet trainer as its Lead-in Fighter Trainer (LIFT) aircraft to replace its aged fleet of over 100 PZL Mielec TS-11 Iskra jets; significantly under cutting BAE and Korea Aerospace/Lockheed Martin in the process. Pieter learns the M346 and Yak 130 share the same development stable, but this does not fit comfortably with some in Poland. They also discuss the current pressure on the national airline LOT to look for both internal and external investment and its recent bad luck with the Boeing 787 service. Capt. Dustin “Skooby” Merritt describes flying on A-10 Thunderbolt II Maj. Matthew Sala talks about flying a LC-130 Follow Infolotnicze on Twitter, Facebook, and Google+. Find Pieter on Twitter as @Nascothornet, on Facebook at XTPMedia, and at the Aviation Xtended podcast. Mentioned: the FAA Modernization and Reform Act of 2012 [PDF] Virgin Atlantic gets up close and personal with Google Glass Cranky Concierge This guesthouse wouldn’t fly in most neighborhoods Opening and closing music courtesy Brother Love from the Album Of The Year CD. You can find his great music at www.brotherloverocks.com.
