Future Availability In Caravans, SEP Line

Welcome to the future... and it's gonna be SO cool. Hot on the heels of Garmin's announcement of FAA certfication for its G1000 Synthetic Vision Technology (SVT) system, planemaker Cessna announced Monday it will offer SVT on all its G1000-equipped aircraft.

First up for the new, advanced technology will be the Citation Mustang, which will also be the first business jet to integrate Garmin’s SVT. Cessna expects to offer SVT on the Caravan family and all Cessna single-engine piston aircraft in the future. (Can you imagine a Skyhawk with synthetic vision? Like we said, this is gonna be cool -- Ed.)

Cessna plans to offer SVT for the Mustang as a factory option later this year. Current plans also call for the Garmin system to be available as an option for single-engine piston aircraft and Caravans within a year. In most cases, SVT capability will be available for retrofit to earlier production Cessna G1000-equipped aircraft.

As ANN reported earlier Monday, Garmin's SVT offers an entirely new level of situational awareness for pilots, by displaying the aircraft’s position on an enhanced topographical database. The combination of synthetic terrain and terrain awareness and warning systems (TAWS) helps pilots identify hazards to their current flight path by displaying terrain and obstacles that pose a threat to the aircraft with the appropriate TAWS terrain alert color.

Garmin SVT also includes pathways, or highway-in-the-sky (HITS), which is depicted as three-dimensional rectangles that guide the pilot along enroute legs, VNAV legs, GPS/WAAS vertical approach procedures, ILS approach procedures, and arrival and departure procedures.

Now certified in 47 countries, the Citation Mustang became the first of a new category of entry-level jets to achieve full certification from the Federal Aviation Administration (September 2006) and the European Aviation Safety Agency (May 2007). Cessna delivered 45 Citation Mustangs in 2007 and the fleet has accumulated more than 10,500 hours.

The six-place Citation Mustang has a top speed of 340 knots, a range of 1,150 nautical miles (with NBAA IFR Reserves) and a service ceiling of 41,000 feet, enabling more efficient operations above most weather and commercial traffic.

From Cessna’s facility in Independence, KS the company expects to deliver 100 Mustangs in 2008 and reach its targeted full production rate of about 150 aircraft per year by the end of 2009.

FMI: www.cessna.com, www.garmin.com