Rodger Renaud was promoted to president of West Star Aviation. Renaud, who has 36 years of aviation experience with companies such as Rockwell International and Midcoast Aviation, most recently was COO for West Star.
Howard Millar was appointed COO of Stellwagen Group, the holding company that includes Dublin, Ireland-based Aviation Finance and Seraph Aviation Management. Millar will also serve as CEO of a newly formed subsidiary, Stellwagen Capital. Formerly he was deputy CEO and CFO of Ryanair Holdings.
Nomad Aviation appointed Pascal Mauerhofer CFO. Mauerhofer, who has 20 years of financial experience, joined Switzerland-based Nomad Aviation from Fiduria, of Berne, Switzerland, where he served as partner and member of the management board.
Tim Maystrik has joined Universal Weather and Aviation as senior v-p, business development. Maystrik has 32 years of industry experience, having previously spent 30 years with Air Routing International and two years with Rockwell Collins.
Heidi Wood has joined L-3 Communications as v-p and chief analytics officer. Wood previously served with Spirit AeroSystems, where she was responsible for strategy, mergers and acquisitions and investor relations, and before that was managing director and global head of aerospace and defense equity research at Morgan Stanley.
Gulfstream Aerospace promoted Colin Miller to v-p of flight operations. Miller is a retired colonel who served 23 years with the U.S. Air Force and has been an experimental test pilot with Gulfstream since 2013.
TAG Aviation Europe has expanded its charter sales team. Florent Sériès, v-p of sales and marketing, has added responsibility for all of TAG Aviation’s sales activities in addition to his charter responsibilities. Andrew Hodgson, formerly aviation director at TCS World Travel, was appointed sales director for charter services in Europe. Andrew Jurd returns to the organization as charter manager for the UK, after serving with Starflight Aviation. Sergio Saz, who has 20 years of aviation experience with Gestair Aviation, Executive Airlines and TAG, will lead charter sales in Spain.
Stevens Aviation promoted Randy Smith to v-p of its mobile maintenance services. Smith has 26 years of experience with Stevens Aviation, and most recently served as general manager of the company’s facility in Nashville, Tenn.
Ruag Aviation appointed David Ricklin general manager at the company’s business aviation maintenance facility and fixed-base operation in Geneva, Switzerland. Ricklin brings 20 years of business aviation experience to this new role. He most recently served as director of maintenance operations/leader Bombardier EMEA for Jet Aviation Basel.
Mooney International named Dirk Vander Zee v-p for sales and marketing. Vander Zee formerly held that role for Mooney before joining Citation sales at Cessna in 1997.
HeliOffshore, the global association for safety in the offshore helicopter industry, appointed Andrea Cicero to its board. Cicero, COO of Babcock’s mission critical services division, succeeds Bill Tame, who is CEO of Babcock’s international division.
Bombardier Business Aircraft president David Coleal and Greenwich AeroGroup president and CEO Jim Ziegler have stepped in to lead committees for the General Aviation Manufacturers Association. Coleal will lead GAMA’s environment committee, succeeding Ed Dolanski, the former president and CEO of Aviall who chaired the committee for two years. Ziegler, meanwhile, is taking the reins of GAMA’s security issues committee from Mark Van Tine, who is retiring from Jeppesen later this month. Van Tine has steered the committee since 2009, when he was also chairman of GAMA. In addition to the new chairmen, GAMA added Austria-based BRP Powertrain-Rotax as a new member. BRP Powertrain produces Rotax engines for ultralight and light aircraft.
Chris Colbath was promoted to director of maintenance of Dumont Aviation’s maintenance, repair and overhaul facility at Central Illinois Regional Airport in Bloomington, Ill. Colbath previously has served as a lead technician at Dumont’s location at New Castle Airport in Delaware and transferred to assist with the opening of the Bloomington facility. Dumont also promoted Darrin Price to general manager of maintenance. Price will continue to oversee operations at the New Castle facility and manage the new interior shop. In addition, the company’s charter unit named Bill Allen COO. Previously Allen was director of operations for JetBlue and spent 15 years as a US Airways pilot.
NBAA added Dan Williams to its board of directors. Williams, who has been a pilot for 29 years, is v-p of aviation and global travel for Wal-Mart Stores, where he has served since 2000.
Jet Aviation appointed Christophe Chicandard regional sales director for Asia-Pacific. Chicandard previously held senior sales or marketing roles with Embraer Executive Jets Asia-Pacific, Air Castle and Bombardier in Asia.
Thomas Frank joined Atlas Air Service as sales manager for Austria and Switzerland. Frank formerly served with pre-owned aircraft sales specialist Jetlevel Jetalliance Holdings and Avia Consult Flugbetriebs.
Trevor Probst joined Constant Aviation as the Embraer Phenom 100/300 program manager. Probst has 13 years of business aviation experience, previously serving as an engine technician for Honeywell Aerospace and as a technician, Embraer Phenom lead and Embraer technical service representative for Stevens Aviation.
Jet Aviation Basel appointed David Peterson director of completions sales. Peterson has 20 years of experience in engineering, sales, account management and customer support, most recently serving as Boeing BBJ’s VIP completions center representative for North Africa and Europe, including Russia.
Petre Liliac joined Spirit Aeronautics as an aircraft maintenance lead technician. Liliac brings 22 years of aircraft maintenance experience to his new role, having previously served with Pentastar Aviation, Corporate Air Management, Northcoast Jet & Jettec, IFL Group and Becker Aviation.
Constant Aviation named Dan Davenport south central regional sales manager. Davenport has 35 years of aviation industry experience, and most recently served as director of airframe programs and regional sales manager for StandardAero.
Raisbeck Engineering appointed Michelle Lieuallen sales support manager. Lieuallen spent the past 10 years with Quest Aircraft in various customer support roles and has also served as a marketing and event coordinator for Nike.
Directional Aviation Capital principal Kenneth Ricci was elected to the board of trustees for the University of Notre Dame. Ricci, whose firm has built a portfolio of aviation businesses that includes Flexjet, Flight Options, Sentient Jet, Nextant Aerospace, Constant Aviation and Corporate Wings, is a 1978 Notre Dame graduate.
Awards and Honors
NBAA named Marne Burghoffer as this year’s recipient of the Dale “Potsy” McBurney Aviation Scholarship. Presented during NBAA’s Flight Attendants/Flight Technicians Conference in June in Delray Beach, Fla., the scholarship benefits business aviation professionals seeking opportunities to advance their careers. Burghoffer is a freelance corporate cabin attendant based in New York, with experience on Bombardier, Gulfstream and Embraer aircraft. She plans to use the scholarship for culinary and cabin safety training courses.
Longtime industry advocate Doug Schwartz received the Flight Safety Foundation’s (FSF) Business Aviation Meritorious Service Award. The award, presented during the FSF/NBAA 61st Business Aviation Safety Summit in May in Austin, Texas, honored Schwartz for “his more than 40 years of commitment and contributions to aviation safety, and for his tireless efforts to advance safety and save lives within the operations of his employers and beyond.”
Currently manager of global aviation services at ConocoPhillips, he has also served as v-p of flight operations at TAG Aviation and director of aviation for AT&T, along with having a 25-year career with FlightSafety International. He has been actively involved in the business aviation community and aviation safety, serving on the NBAA board since 2004 and past chairman of NBAA’s safety committee. He also serves on FSF’s board of governors. He is credited as a pioneer in the development of crew resource management, and was instrumental in introducing the first CRM programs tailored for business aviation.
Daher, in concert with the Experimental Aircraft Association, is awarding internships under an international scholarship program to Kristin Sandager of Albert Lea, Minn., and Dalton Nonweiler of Tulsa, Okla. The students will spend five weeks at Daher’s Tarbes facility in France followed by a week at the EAA Air Academy in Oshkosh.
Sandager is a junior at Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University in Prescott, Ariz., where she is majoring in mechanical engineering with a focus on robotics. Nonweiler is a freshman at Washington University in St. Louis, Mo., with a major in mechanical engineering and a minor in aerospace engineering focusing on aeroshape and performance.
Rich Martindell, v-p of course content and experience at King Schools, was named as the FAA 2016 Safety Team Representative of the Year. The recognition will be awarded as part of the General Aviation Awards program during EAA AirVenture in July at Oshkosh, Wis. At King Schools Martindell maintains 90 courses that range from sport pilot to airline transport pilot, including ground school, practical test preparation, refresher courses and topical flight training courses. A former U.S. Air Force fighter pilot, he also has been the lead representative of the FAA Safety Team in San Diego and frequently speaks at EAA chapters, flight schools, flying clubs and airport businesses. He is also a member of the San Diego Airports Aviation Advisory Committee.
Final Flight
J. Kenneth Forester, 94, founder of Teterboro, N.J.-based Meridian, died June 1. Known as “Ken Sr.” to distinguish him from his son, who later joined the family business, Forester had a half-century career as a pilot, maintenance technician and executive in aviation services.
Forester’s aviation career began in December 1941, following the attack on Pearl Harbor. He joined the U.S. Army Air Corps and earned a private pilot certificate a year later. He became an engineering test pilot in 1943 and flew fighters, bombers and transports over the next three years.
After the war, he founded Mallard Air Service, serving as a charter, maintenance base and distributor for the Republic Seabee and North American Navion. Forester later managed a wire machinery plant in Paterson, N.J., and sold Navions at Teterboro Airport before founding Meridian’s predecessor company, initially known as General Aviation Company, in 1958 on the west side of Teterboro Airport.
His son Ken took over the management of the company in 1974, and in 1986 it became a Million Air franchise. The company was rebranded as Meridian in 2006, when it reverted to being an independently owned and operated entity.
Forester was inducted into the New Jersey Aviation Hall of Fame in 2008 and was awarded the Charles Taylor Master Mechanic award in 2002.
