24 | Flight International | 22 August-4 September 2017 flightglobal.com

All images by Jeremy Dwyer-Lindgren

MICHAEL GERZANICS FRESNO

Jet set go

Very light jets had a bright future until the global financial crisis turned the air taxi dream

into a nightmare. Cirrus kept its personal Vision alive with the SF50 – we put it to the test

COVER STORY

T

he very light jet (VLJ) market is seem-

ingly one that has always had a great

future ahead of it.

One need look no further than the

Eclipse 500 to see the divergence between the

promise and reality of this harsh segment.

The economic downturn of 2008 and the

demise of charter operator DayJet, the Eclipse

500’s largest customer, sounded the death

knell for Eclipse Aviation.

While the Eclipse brand’s new owner, One

Aviation, has continued serial production of

the type with the 550 and the Project Canada

stretched variant, current orders are nowhere

near the backlog peak of more than 2,500 for

the original 500.

Into this barren landscape a new VLJ has

sprouted: the Cirrus Vision Jet. Launched in

2006 as the SF50, the single-engined VLJ re-

ceived US Federal Aviation Administration

certification in October 2016, with European

Aviation Safety Agency certification the fol-

lowing May.

While “sprouted” might be a strange term

to use in a flight review, the Vision Jet’s roots

stem from Cirrus’ extremely successful series

of piston-powered singles – the SR20 and

SR22. Rather than developing a piston-twin

or turboprop to offer enhanced performance,

Cirrus jumped into the deep end of the pool

with a single-engined turbofan.

While the marketplace will determine where

it flourishes, the Vision Jet is aimed squarely at

current SR pilots looking to move up.

ROOMY FEEL

One trait that has helped differentiate Cir-

rus’s piston offerings from those of legacy

manufacturers is their large and airy cabins.

The Vision Jet continues this signature trait.

The cabin’s cross section is weighted to pro-

vide ample room for the first two rows of

seats: two at the instrument panel and two