On October 21, Eclipse Aviation formally placed defunct charter operator DayJet’s 28 Eclipse 500s on the used airplane market. According to the manufacturer, the airplanes will be sold in “as is” condition. At last month’s NBAA Convention, Eclipse chairman and CEO Roel Pieper told AIN, “We have the responsibility to refurbish the aircraft and bring them back into the market.” Although a group of buyers led by Houston-based JetsAmerica was planning to offer $500,000 each for the DayJet Eclipses, Pieper believes that prices should trend higher and that fleet buyers waiting for Eclipse 500 deliveries might want to buy some of the former DayJet airplanes so they can launch their businesses earlier.
JetsAmerica had planned to make its low-bid offer directly to UT Finance, the United Technologies subsidiary that holds equity in the DayJet airplanes, but Pieper said that Eclipse must approve any sale of those airplanes. The 28 airplanes are still outfitted in DayJet livery, including leather seats, and have accumulated between 150 and 450 cycles. Some have remaining time on the original Eclipse warranty, and none of the 28 jets has Avio 1.5 avionics upgrades or flight-into-known-icing capability.
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