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A green Lamborghini for a pop of color.
plane’ and ‘the performance sucks,’ Or ‘You will never be able to fly it out of your airport in Heber [City, Utah],’ ‘or be able to fly with passengers and full fuel.’ Just things like that. So I started researching the plane myself, and it didn’t seem nearly as bad as the opinions people were sharing with- out knowing the plane personally,” he began. “I knew about the company being in bankruptcy for a long time. I talked with some facilities about parts availability. They told me that support isn’t as big of an issue as people try to make it out to be. Parts are pretty easy to come by and whatnot.”
He made his decision and jumped right in. Georgalos acted so quickly that he had a plane lined up for pur- chase before scheduling type-rating training. Like the challenges with his Bonanza, The Eclipse’s insurance re- quirements were a point of contention.
“I decided not to sign the contract on the Meridian and found a 400-hour total time Eclipse out of Texas. I only contacted f light schools once I had already purchased the plane. Initial- ly, three flight schools told me there was no way, with so few hours, that I could get my type rating for that plane. They told me that the hardest thing in aviation to do is get a type rating, and with my time, it just wasn’t possible for an Eclipse. The insurance companies didn’t like the idea, but I got one to agree to require fifty hours
24 • TWIN & TURBINE / October 2023
of dual instruction in the plane like I had in my Bonanza.”
He continued his aircraft transi- tion explanation, noting that he found a solution to his training dilemma shortly after overcoming the insurance hurdles. He discovered a well-known Eclipse f light instructor willing to ac- cept him as a student. In addition to his enthusiastic dedication to learning, one of the things that swung the deci- sion in Georgalos’ favor was that he was only 30 years old at the time. The instructor believed his youth could be a benefit in the daunting task of learn- ing to fly such a complex machine.
“We f lew around the whole South- western United States, f lying from cheapest fuel to cheapest fuel. We would fly for a few hours in the morn- ing, stop for lunch, then fly for a few more hours and hit a hotel. To wake up and do it all over again the next morn- ing. As this happened, I remember watching the news and learning about this Covid thing starting to spread around in February 2020. I made it out of that with two weeks to spare before quarantine requirements set in, finishing my 50 hours and taking my checkride. I have had the Eclipse for three and a half years, with around 470 hours flying it. I love it. It’s just a great aircraft.”
Overall, the plane meets Georga- los’ standards and is relied upon in its
varied missions, including short and long stage-length trips.
“It has a few things that limit it, but for the most part, I can get 95 percent or better of what I want to get done. I have three kids, so I am flying around with five seats con- stantly filled. My typical missions are around the West Coast, and I often fly to California and Las Vegas. But I have stretched its legs quite a bit, having gone to The Bahamas once and South Florida for business. When I go that far, I typically land in Hammond, Louisiana, with some of the cheapest fuel in the country, then fly right over the Gulf. Coming back to Utah, it’s right on the money that I have to stop perfectly in the middle, and I’m right at the reserve amount I want to land with. I always make it back in one fuel stop, but it’s tight,” Georgalos claims.
“One of the things that I love the most about the plane is that it’s pretty short-field capable, especially for a jet. I fly into many airports that no other jets have ever f lown into. I’m constant- ly flying out of airports with 3,000-foot runways where you typically only see small, single-engine aircraft. People are staring at me during those times, and it’s awesome! My Eclipse is version 2.5, so I have auto throttles and ABS. Those capabilities make the aircraft ultra-useful when f lying into small airports with tight patterns.”
Not only does Georgalos proclaim that the Eclipse 500 is a blast to fly, but he also says it’s an economi- cal performer.
“I love the plane because it’s super- efficient and cheap to fly. During lon- ger trips, I fly at FL400 or FL410. At these altitudes, I’m seeing a total fuel burn of about 54 gallons per hour. Low- er around FL300, we’ll see fuel burns in the mid-60s [gallons per hour]. So, it is an efficient airplane, especially up high. For maintenance, you will have a year when you spend twenty grand, and you’ll have another year where you’ll spend three or four times that. Averaging that out, call it 50 thousand. If you fly a few hundred hours yearly, it’s not too bad. I think of the Eclipse as around a $700-per-hour plane, which for a jet is insane.”