Flight Plan

A century ago, man couldn't fly. Now, people take flight for granted. But man's ability to fly was earned through the blood, sweat, tears and deaths of pioneers and visionaries. A new four-part series produced by KCET/Hollywood, "Chasing the Sun," celebrates these buccaneers of the sky. "We don't think of these incredible people who were risking their lives every time they got into a plane," says Carl Byker, executive producer-writer and director of "Chasing the Sun."

Boeing Co. said it plans a nearly two-hour test flight of a 787 Dreamliner to test its proposed fix for the lithium-ion battery systems that led to the commercial jet's grounding in January. The flight on Monday is the latest attempt by the aerospace giant to win approval from the Federal Aviation Administration and get the 787 fleet airborne again. During the test, the 787 - a production airplane built for LOT Polish Airlines - was scheduled to take off at 11 a.m. Pacific time and land at Paine Field in Everett, Wash.

Gael, Gemma and Matt--siblings in their 30s--have been in limbo ever since their parents' small Cessna disappeared over Labrador. Now a year has passed, and Gael is determined to move on with her life by moving from the family estate in upstate New York back to the big city. But Gemma is still an agoraphobic, obsessed with clipping her mother's magazines, while Matt seems to have disappeared almost as thoroughly as their parents.

Re "The last dance," Sept. 22 I have been struck by the outpouring of positive emotion over Endeavour's final flight. I wish the space shuttle could have flown over every major American city, sparking patriotism for some peaceful national goal that supersedes politics. People of all political stripes are sick of all the negative energy and want to believe in what has made our country the envy of the world. We need another national goal to re-dedicate our imagination to the evolution of mankind.

The United Nations gave the government and rebels in Angola notice of the flight plan for a plane that was shot down, a U.N. spokesman said. The plane was believed hit by antiaircraft fire and went down Saturday with eight people aboard. There was no word on survivors. The C-130 was the second U.N.-chartered aircraft to crash in the war zone in eight days.

Rep. Robert E. Badham on Monday asked the Federal Aviation Administration to adopt a special flight plan for John Wayne Airport that would separate commercial airline traffic from small private planes and prohibit airliners from making visual landings.

Flight charts cover the living room floor of Ilse de Vries' Brentwood home these days. Every day, De Vries, 64, studies the route she plans to follow in her Beechcraft Bonanza in an around-the-world, Paris-to-Paris air race this summer. She will be the only woman flying a single-engine plane in the international competition for light aircraft. Eventually, she will cut up 12 charts to form a scroll, because there's no room in the plane to spread out a chart. There are other preparations.

Donald Carty, the president of American Airlines, stopped in Los Angeles recently to touch bases with his troops in Southern California. Carty, the likely successor to Robert Crandall, chief executive of American and its parent, AMR Corp., also met with reporters for a wide-ranging discussion about the airline industry.

After 10 years of questions about the dangers of ice accumulating on an aircraft's wings before takeoff, the Federal Aviation Administration has finally announced an overhaul of its winter safety procedures for commercial airliners. Now the question is: After this decade of inaction, will the agency stick to its flight plan, as it were, and follow through to make sure that airline passengers are protected? Since 1982 there have been more than 100 deaths in 24 ice-related airliner accidents.

Donovan Fell makes coffee tables out of jet engines, conference tables from airplane wings and desk chairs out of pilot ejection seats. And last year, his furniture brought in $1.5 million. Fell is co-owner of MotoArt, a Torrance-based company that turns vintage aviation parts into fixtures for the home and office, if the buyer has an aviation fixation. Or just wants something unique. None of it comes cheap.

Re "Endeavour to begin California adventure," Sept. 20, and "Shuttle gets final clearance," Sept. 18 It is too late now, but did those in charge of planning Endeavour's trip from Los Angeles International Airport to the California Science Center consider removing the wings of the shuttle rather than requiring the destruction of so many trees? Considering that the shuttle will never again be launched into space, why couldn't the wings be removed at the airport and reattached at the museum?

A small aircraft has crashed off Florida after it was seen aimlessly circling the Gulf of Mexico and repeated attempts by authorities to make contact with the pilot failed. At one point, military aircraft were called in for a possible attempt to intercept the troubled plane to protect public safety. The fate of the pilot -- the only person on board -- remains unclear. But there were some suggestions that the plane hit the water "gracefully," according to CNN commentators who were watching the dramatic situation unfold live.

Bangkok's pigeons are little winged street toughs, nurtured on dust, dirt and noise. So, the local government, out of the goodness of its heart (or maybe after a look in its pocket), has decided they need a little "holiday" in the country. We're sending them to the forest, officials said recently, to live a life of luxury, clean air and food aplenty. "It's friendlier in the forest," said Teerachon Manomaiphibul, deputy governor of Bangkok, and pigeon relocator in chief.

When Colbie Caillat sings on her new album about being fearless, you figure she's speaking in relative terms. After all, this 24-year-old artist from Malibu has ascended to the ranks of pop's top-selling stars thanks to a series of hit singles that virtually define the absence of creative risk: "Bubbly," "Realize," "The Little Things" -- each arrives on a gentle wave of acoustic guitar and laid-back vocals, with safe-as-milk lyrics that wouldn't upset...

When Clifton Moore ran the Los Angeles airport system from 1968 to 1993, there wasn't much emphasis on dining and shopping for people waiting for their planes at LAX. About all they could get were the basics: a newspaper, a cup of coffee, cafeteria fare and a preflight libation. The mantra was "We are an airport, not a shopping mall," and people on the staff were proud that Los Angeles International Airport had the least concession space of any major airport in the United States. Not anymore.

I used to be happy that our daughter went to college in New York, because we live in Los Angeles, which meant four years without so much as a single connecting flight. I used to be happy because airlines were fighting for my business and I could pretty much find a flight at any time of day. In the wake of jet-fuel price spikes and route cancellations this fall, I have had to alter my approach. We may go back East for Thanksgiving instead of bringing our daughter home, simply because we can leave a day early or come home a day late, while she is bound, like hundreds of thousands of undergraduates, by a class schedule that forces her to fly on the busiest days of the year.

Two small planes collided near Tokio, Wash., killing at least three people when one of the craft crashed, officials said. The other plane, carrying three people, landed safely at Ritzville Airport, a Federal Aviation Administration official in Seattle said. Three bodies were recovered from the wreckage, but it was feared that there may be a fourth victim, since the plane's flight plan had indicated four people aboard, the official said. Authorities were investigating the cause of the crash.

Los Angeles International Airport, battered by financially devastated domestic airlines, is now headed for trouble from overseas. Foreign carriers, until now a bright spot for the airport in an increasingly dismal year, are slashing flights at LAX amid high fuel costs and slowing international demand, dealing yet another blow to Southern California's economy. For Southern California passengers, the cuts would add to travel woes including fewer nonstop flights to overseas destinations, higher fares and crowded planes, experts said.

MOST club owners like to think of their spots as being original. The management behind Orange County's new wannabe hot spot Flight Bistro is no different. "It's unique in Huntington because of the look and ambience," assistant manager Cristina Barbatti says. The concept behind the new venue, though, is straight out of the contemporary night life handbook.