Eclipse Repairing Damaged Aircraft

Eclipse Aviation’s fourth conforming flight-test aircraft, N505EA, which made a gear-up landing on September 4 at Albuquerque International Sunport, will be repaired and back in the air by the end of this month, according to a company spokesman. The two pilots on board were not injured during the accident, and Eclipse said the cause of the belly landing was pilot error. The spokesman said none of its five test aircraft has an operational gear-up warning system. Meanwhile, Eclipse last month completed airframe static testing for the very light jet. As such, the FAA has cleared the Eclipse 500 to an initial 10,000-hour lifetime. FAA certification of the Eclipse 500 is scheduled for March.