Following the September 11 attacks of last year and a general slump in the world economy, it has been an up-and-down year for business aviation in Europe. In January, one of the UK's long-established charterers took its final breath. Chauffair had slipped into receivership after 20 years in business and Pricewaterhouse-Coopers was receiving strong interest for its purchase.

No such decline for Spain’s Gestair, who in February was taking its 18-strong AOC fleet to 19 with the addition of a Global Express.

At the same time as Raytheon’s Premier 1 gained its German certification, Bombardier was racking up orders for its Continental (now Challenger 300) business jet and the second flying prototype of Ibis's Ae270 propjet was airborne for the first time.

Stealing EBAN's headlines in March was Midwest Executive Aviation, who had just begun FBO operations at Coventry Airport in the UK. Also in the news were Germany’s Heli Transair with their addition of an Agusta A109E Power, Ireland’s Eurojet after a Citation Excel delivery and French manufacturer Airbus, who was busy whetting our appetite for a corporate version of its four-engine A340-200.

In April, Porsche replaced a Bravo with an Encore and Belgium’s Sky Service added a duo of King Air 200s for its fractional ownership scheme.

Over in Chicago, Boeing was displaying a new focus on the replacement market for ageing government transport and head of state aeroplanes. A study had revealed that half the world fleet was due for replacement over the next decade.

Half way through the year, Air Charter Guide told us that bookings for medium-sized jets in Europe were up 12.7 per cent on the previous year, slightly ahead of light jets which were up 9.1 per cent and heavy jets which were up 7.5 per cent. What’s more, they added, the increase in bookings from business travellers was part of an international trend.

As if to confirm these findings, Occitania opened a new base in Madrid, Sheffield City Airport was opening its doors ever wider to GA and European Skytime was busy offering fixed price hourly rates in four and eight seat aircraft. Air Partner, meanwhile, had set up shop in the Middle East.

The second EBACE convention in Geneva gave TAG the opportunity to show off its new handling and office facilities at Geneva Airport and also provided the venue for Embraer’s sale of a Legacy jet to one of Europe’s largest real estate developers - Fadesa of Spain.

Industry stalwart Keith Elkington retired from Inflite the Jet Centre in July after 40 years’ service. The omens were clearly in the air – he’d accidentally reversed over his laptop a few days earlier. Back in the world of aircraft additions, Norway’s Sundt Air enthused about a Challenger 604 and ExecuJet about a trio of Global Expresses.

Over in the UK, bad news was just emerging from the North Sea, where the crash of a Bristow helicopters’ Sikorsky S76A (because of a broken rotor blade) had claimed the lives of all eleven onboard.

Gentleman’s club Spearmint Rhino were the unlikely front-page bedfellow for Bavarian Premier Edmund Stoiber in September. While the former had added a Cessna 421C for European travel, our front-page photo pictured the latter surveying the flood-hit town of Dresden, Germany. The floods also caused deaths and millions of pounds worth of damage in the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Austria and Russia.

Piaggio accelerated production of its P180 in October, from 16 this year to 21 next, despite Honeywell’s warning that month that business aircraft deliveries would decline modestly across North America, Latin America, Europe and Asia in 2002 and 2003.

And just last month, Adam Aircraft told us abut its A700 plans - just shy of two million US dollars, the business jet will fly at 41,000 feet, ‘facilitate access to thousands of close-in community airports’ and will be with us by 2004.