The Future of the Flight Line?

An Interview with Walter Da Costa, TECNAM’S Chief Sales Officer

ARTICLE BY SEAMUS HUNTER LYONS / Correspondent

PHOTOS BY TECNAM

DESIGN BY SALIM ROIG / Senior Reporter

With the Embry-Riddle Flight Department considering options for replacing the current fleet of Diamond DA-42s, multiple aircraft types have been rumored. While no official decision has been made on what will replace the DA-42, there was a unique visitor to campus last month — the Tecnam P2006T. This high-wing twin-piston trainer is popular with many flight schools worldwide and could be Embry-Riddle Daytona’s new multi-trainer. I was lucky enough to tour the aircraft and meet the Chief Sales Officer, Walter Da Costa. I asked Mr. Da Costa some open-ended questions to better understand what Tecnam has to offer.

The Avion (TA): How was Tecnam formed?

Walter Da Costa (WDC): Tecnam’s history dates back to the mid-1940s when Giovanni and Luigi Pascale unleashed their passion for aviation by funding the Partenavia Aircraft Company in 1948. Since that date, a 75-year history of dedication to the aviation industry continues today, with the second and the third generations of leadership with a growing passion, to create and deliver hundreds of General Aviation masterpieces all over the world, every year.

In addition to being a fully approved supplier to the commercial aviation sector, Tecnam has delivered more than 7,500 aircraft just in the last 30 years, propelling it to world leadership within the aviation community. Tecnam Aircraft operate in over 60 countries supported by more than 170 dealer and Tecnam Service Centers. Tecnam’s position in aviation has grown around the globe. The company’s dedication to the piston and training segment is proven by the innovation.

In 10 years, Tecnam has certified six clean sheet aircraft through EASA / FAA Certifications including an 11-seat piston commuter twin, the P2012 Traveller. Tecnam’s focus on piston aircraft demonstrates that the company will continue to offer the widest range of General Aviation airplanes in the market today and in the future.

Tecnam has three strategic locations to support all customers around the world. In Italy, the entire development, design, certification, and production activity is located around the Naples area with three facilities of 413,000 square feet and 42,000 square feet under construction. In the USA, the management of North American sales, deliveries, and spare parts at Sebring, Florida [are located]. And Australia — management of Oceania sales, deliveries, and spare parts. Tecnam’s main assembly plant is located in the town of Capua, in the beautiful countryside of Southern Italy, just north of Naples, in the millennial-history region where people travel from all over the world to enjoy Pompei, Capri, Positano, and the Amalfi Coast while absorbing the Italian land and culture.

Employing more than 500 skilled artisans, today, Tecnam is one of the top three manufacturers of piston aircraft in the General Aviation market according to the General Aviation Manufacturers Association (GAMA).

TA: What is Tecnam’s Mission?

WDC: Tecnam’s mission is to support customers’ business by condensing 75 years of aviation expertise to produce the safest, best flying quality, and most efficient airplanes. What Tecnam has been doing is to provide new and modern aircraft to the General Aviation community that incorporate the latest certification standards, engineered at their finest to achieve the best reliability, safety, performance, efficiency, and sustainability while providing the highest level of customer support. As a family business, Tecnam’s mission is also kind of personal; the “P” on the tail of every airplane signifies that every single aircraft is personally inspected and often flown by Paolo and Giovanni, Tecnam CEO and Managing Director, respectively. This is something that you will not find in any other aviation manufacturer in the world.

TA: What are some of the popular applications for Tecnam aircraft outside of flight training?

WDC: Flight Training is certainly one of our main drivers. All Tecnam trainers have been designed with flight schools in mind, and their flying qualities, along with parts, commonality, and superior support are what our customers like the most.

With a complete, single-source solution for flight schools, ranging from the only worldwide available IFR-certified two-seater (the P-Mentor) to the renowned P2008 up to our four-seat P2010 (single engine available with three engine options) and P2006T (the most efficient twin-engine trainer in the world), Tecnam can support Flight Schools with a single source fleet solution. Tecnam not only means training, but it is also the only aircraft manufacturer in the world with a catalog ranging from light sport models to an 11-seat regional airline aircraft. These offerings help to serve the widest end-user requirements.

In addition, Special Mission applications with our aircraft are a constantly growing opportunity with our aircraft as well. Tecnam “SMP” variants of our

P2006T and P2012 enhance extremely profitable law enforcement, patrolling, and aerial imagery businesses for hundreds of US and Worldwide customers. Today, flight training represents 55% of our market share in terms of sales. Then, we have 15% from private owners and 30% from commercial operators.

TA: What are some of the unique features of the P2006 aircraft?

WDC: The P2006T has numerous unique features and benefits beginning with its sleek aerodynamic design which provides pilots with precise and predictable flight operations. The wing, fuselage, and tail components are constructed of alloy metal, which allows for operation in a rugged environment while incorporating the latest FAA Certification and design characteristics that support the safety of flight and reliability. The P2006T is certainly one of Tecnam’s most successful designs; it has been elected by independent organizations, including NASA, as the most fuel-efficient, and most sustainable General Aviation Twin engine platform currently available in the marketplace. The P2006T was designed around the engines, and this supports its reputation of aircraft of choice for the most innovative flight schools.

Thousands of pilots have gained their Multi-Engine Rating with the Tecnam P2006T, due to its flying qualities, reliability, and with its fuel consumption as low as 4.5 US gallons per engine per hour. For allowing VFR/ VFR Night / IFR / MEP/ IR / PBN (LNAV-VNAV, LPV), the P2006T is a complete training solution for complex training.

ARTICLE BY TUCKER LEHTONEN / Sta Reporter PHOTOS BY TUCKER LEHTONEN / Sta Reporter DESIGN BY DAVID GUERRA / Sta Photographer

If you know anything about me, you know I love to watch races. I enjoy listening to them, I enjoy the rumble that sits deep within your chest, I love the smell of fuel in the air, and every related aspect of the sport. It’s a great reminder to show how close you can ride the ragged edge and still have to do better than everyone else and with the luck that tires haven’t popped, or radiator hoses haven’t burst, etc.

is leads me to di erent races and tournaments that I’ve experienced. I went to the Rolex 24 hour race at the Daytona International Speedway. I couldn’t help to feel as if the teams there were just rich snobs driving their supercars around a track for 24 hours. I felt unsatis ed because of the lack of humanity. It just did not feel right.

Just a er the Rolex 24, I got a phone call from my grandfa- ther and he invited me out tothe Volusia Speedway Park in De Leon Springs. I took him up on this o er and I went out. My cousin was also there at the time, as he does photography and interviews on the dirt racing series. I watched sprint cars and modi eds race around the track.

I got special pit access and got up close and personal with all the cars, and victory lane. It was an entirely di erent vibe, here it was regular people who built their car and go and race on the weekends. Everyone in the sport is close, which I admire.

It was a culture shock, and I fell in love with this sport. I appreciated that I, a regular Joe, was able to walk up to the drivers a er the races and have a conversation with them.

I was able to talk with Travis

Pastrana (he just raced in the Daytona 500).

I also got to talk directly to Justin Allgaier who races in the in nity series (7).

Overall, it was a memorable experience that I plan on revisiting soon.

ARTICLE BY SALIM ROIG / Senior Reporter

PHOTOS BY JONATHAN SAIER / Correspondent

DESIGN BY DYLAN KOWLESSAR / Editor-in-Chief

ARTICLE BY JORDAN KILPATRICK WILLIAMS / Correspondent

PHOTOS BY GREAT BAH / Correspondent

DESIGN BY A. AKIE OLESZEWSKI / Sta Designer

ARTICLE BY DR. GEOFFREY KAIN / Correspondent PHOTOS BY H. PRESTON LUNIEWSKI /

e Honors Program was established on the Daytona Beach campus in 2003. One of the bene ts o ered to Honors Program students has been the Honors Series. is program focuses on hosting both speakers and performers with national, and o en international, notoriety.

e Honors Series has now featured more than 100 such events over the years, and on Feb. 22 the Honors Series welcomed Winona LaDuke to campus.

Ms. LaDuke is a famed Harvardeducated Native American activist, economist, author, and spokesperson for indigenous and environmental rights in the United States. She is a two-time US vice-presidential candidate (in 1996 and again in 2000) alongside Ralph Nader on the Green Party ticket, a 2007 inductee into the National Women’s Hall of Fame,

Ms magazine’s Woman of the Year (1997), one of Time magazine’s 50 most promising leaders under forty (1994), and now serves as executive director of the Honor the Earth organization.

Her most recent book publication, To Be a Water Protector (2020), details the challenges faced across the globe due to dwindling access to clean, fresh water in the face of increasing contamination from industrial agriculture, mining, oil pipelines, chemical spills, etc. More speci cally, the novel details her headto-head battles with the multinational Canadian energy corporation, Enbridge.

Enbridge’s dogged insistence on expanding their Line 3 tar sands oil pipeline across water-rich northern Minnesota—near and through waters and wild rice habitat sacred to LaDuke’s Anishinaabe (Ojibway) people (she is a long-time resident and leader on the White Earth Reservation)—brought her and many Water Protector protestors out to face o with the company over their oil pipeline. Her talk at EmbryRiddle re ected her book title: “What Does it Mean to be a Water Protector… in Florida?”

A large number of environmentallyconcerned individuals from across Volusia County, and even from as far away as Gainesville and Ft. Myers, traveled to hear her speak. Mr. Jim Durocher, East Central Regional Director of the Florida Rights of Nature Network and active proponent of the “Florida Right to Clean Water” movement, commented that LaDuke “can take understatement, mix it with indigenous wisdom and spirit, and turn it to profound logic.” His sentiments were echoed by many, including a number of the Florida Right to Clean Water members who attended. LaDuke pointed to signs of diminishing investment in what she calls “late-stage fossil fuel addiction”, while turning toward more viable, realistic, clean solutions for the future.

For her own part, aside from struggling on site for several years to blockade Enbridge in northern Minnesota, LaDuke is investing heavily in non-chemical, regenerative farming techniques, as well as solar and wind energy projects. She has also begun expansion of her hemp farming commitment, from its current 40 acres to nearly over 400 acres. She has labeled this latter e ort the “New Green Revolution,” citing hemp’s multiplicity of uses; from fabrics to insulation, to construction materials (as hempcrete), etc. While it requires far less water than other row crops, it is a premium carbon-sequestering plant, requires no pesticide application, and even holds promise for the emerging electric vehicle battery market (research on hemp biochar as base is proving exceptionally encouraging).

On her White Earth Reservation locale, they are using horse manure for fertilizer and—given the present size of the farm—horses also provide the power for plowing, etc. LaDuke sees their operation as a model, and one that she encourages as a highly desirable alternative to plastics-based materials and oil/gas-dependent farming methods. She works with other indigenous communities on economic development, and she sees many of the indigenous communities getting excited and on board quickly. As she wryly puts it, “We are the tip of the spear.”

ARTICLE BY SALIM ROIG / Senior Reporter

PHOTOS BY YOSIF MLADENOV / Correspondent

DESIGN BY MIKYLA BERISH / Managing Editor