"C J Campbell" wrote in message
...

"Casey Wilson" wrote in message
...
Does a general aviation industry exist in mainland China? I'm
planning
a vacation trip there in 2005 and, if it is possible, would like to
arrange
for two or three hours of dual instruction in a spam-can.

GA is in its infancy in China. Until very recently, China sent all
would-be
pilots out of country for initial training up through instrument rating,
multi-engine, and commercial before bringing them back to work for the
national airline. The United States got a lot of them. Right now China is
beginning to develop a GA market to generate their own pilots and to
provide
better support for tourism, skydiving, and the 2008 Olympics.

Last I heard, there were still less than 400 GA aircraft in China. If
there
any airplanes for rental in China, it would be at Beijing Sport Aviation
School or at Anyang Sport Aviation School in Beijing. A company called PTE
is the Cessna agent in China and handles Cessna sales and service. Anyang
and PTE are the operators of A&P Light Aircraft Service.

There's also a big school near Shanghai. Most "GA" planes in China
are used as commerical transports or for training. It's not strictly true
about China outsourcing all its pilots as a lot came from the military
and these have been trained in-house, starting generally in the CJ-6.
You'll find a lot of these, but probably not for hire, they probably all
belong to schools.

The school near Shanghai has just bought some 172s.
http://www.seaet.com/english/gsjj-e.htm

They're manufacturing some new GA planes in China, though these
seem to be aimed at the commercial end, like twins for air taxi work,
cropdusters, and so on.

The microlight (ultralight) industry out there seems to be the way most
people who want to fly for sport get involved, but it's also not so huge.
I know of a microlight place near Nanning, but being too heavy and too
large for one of those, I didn't persue it. They had a flying club there too
but apparently it lost all its planes, didn't get any new ones and just
became an excuse for people to socialise.

Another news story to look at...
http://fpeng.peopledaily.com.cn/2000...408_38531.html

Paul