Highway to the Honda zone

And now, Maverick flies a HondaJet. Actor and longtime pilot Tom Cruise recently took delivery of his HondaJet with its custom paint scheme designed to invoke images of a sports car. Among pilots, at least, Cruise is best known as Maverick, the spontaneous young fighter pilot in the movie Top Gun—a sequel of which is due out soon.

Honda Aircraft President and CEO Michimasa Fujino described Cruise as a thoughtful, well-prepared pilot.

Meanwhile, the company is also introducing a seventh member of its U.S. service network. FlyAdvanced in Wilmington, Delaware, will provide service to HondaJets in the Mid-Atlantic region. Fujino reported that some 140 of the twinjets are in service and have accumulated 40,000 flight hours with a 99.7-percent dispatch rate.

To meet pilot training demands, a second FlightSafety International simulator will be in service in Farnborough, England, by April 2020. The training center will complement the center at the Honda factory in Greensboro, North Carolina. There, the simulator operates about 20 hours a day, according to Fujino.

Hawaiian charter group Wing Spirit is developing a medevac version of the aircraft for its inter-island service. It has placed orders for 15 of the aircraft.