The latest newsletter from Icon Aircraft has some great pictures and exciting news in it. In spite of tough economic times, they are continuing to make progress on development of their A5 amphibian LSA and they have secured 400 orders.

This picture, from the newsletter, shows the A5 making a very tight water turn. They've done some very detailed design work and have achieved new heights of maneuverability, staiblity and usability with the A5. I'm interested to hear the pilot reports when this aircraft hits the market.

Speaking of pilots, Icon has gathered some statistics on their 400 orders and other prospective customers. They report that although 65% of their customers have an average of 3700 flight hours, 35% of their customers are not even pilots yet. This means the Icon A5 is helping to make the Sport Pilot rating something that will draw people to flying who otherwise might not have ever become pilots. At the same time, sport flying appears to be attractive to long-time professional pilots. I think these are great signs for the LSA market in general and for Icon aircraft specifically.

Icon gets a lot of coverage on this site for two reasons. First, I think they have a great product that I think will be a powerhouse in the LSA market. Second, they make it easy for us to keep up on their progress by sending us frequent newsletters and press releases. If you'd like your aircraft to get more coverage, please contact us. We are more than glad to cover any interesting aviation news and will do our best to report on what you send us.