Jetfly Aviation Offers TBM Fractionals

You're pacing your office in Paris. It's past 9 a.m., a vital fax has not yet arrived, you've just been informed you'll need to stop in Nancy, and still be in Geneva for lunch. No theoretical time management problem, these were the real conditions Monday. And Jacques Lemaigre du Breuil couldn't have been more pleased.

CEO and founder of Jetfly Aviation, these are exactly the kinds of conditions that have helped the Luxembourg-based TBM fractional grow to six aircraft -- the sixth being delivered yesterday -- since beginning operations in 2000.

We were off Le Bourget by 9:45, gave Paris and President Bush's entourage a wide berth, and headed east. Climbing out at 160 kts. and 1,500 fpm, the TBM was soon cruising in the mid-20s. Lemaigre du Breuil cranks the waypoints to LFSN into the dual Garmins, and settles into the hands-free flight.
"There's nothing for the pilot to do on this airplane, other than to make sure the gear is down," he laughed. The former banker bought his first TBM in 1999, "I was like a baby in front of a Christmas tree," he recalls.

After 45 minutes, we're on final to Nancy's 3000-plus-foot runway -- easy for the TBM. Jetfly operates regular flights out of Courchevel, a 400-meter-long strip nestled in the French Alps.

Depositing a Socata mechanic to attend to an Army TBM-AOG with a faulty oil temp gauge-we were southbound now, a 60-kt .headwind slowing us to a 230 kt. ground speed. Still, within 45 minutes we were touching down on Geneva's rain-splashed runway, ready for lunch.

Jetfly trips average 1.8 passengers flying 1.25 hours, making the TBM the ideal air carriage. Lemaigre du Breuil is confident that by 2005 his young firm will be operating 30 throughout Europe.

By William Garvey