The Scissortail Brief | April 13–19, 2026

Each week, Scissortail looks back at the news of the previous seven days and aggregates it for you in The Scissortail Brief. This week, Congress passed safety legislation that’s been in the works since the Reagan National collision, the FAA quietly completed a NOTAM system transition that was a long time coming, Europe’s largest bizav trade show was canceled before it ever opened, American Airlines planted a flag in the private jet market, Augusta wrapped up Masters week with actuals that came in below forecast, and fuel prices moved up enough to change how operators are thinking about trip planning.

So read on, BizAv family. You might find something useful.

The ALERT Act Passes the House

On April 14, the House passed the Airspace Location and Enhanced Risk Transparency Act (the ALERT Act) by a bipartisan vote.

The bill addresses NTSB recommendations from the January 2025 midair collision near Reagan National. It requires all civil fixed-wing aircraft and rotorcraft to equip with collision mitigation, avoidance, and alerting systems, while acknowledging that the business aviation fleet is too diverse for a single compliance path. Technical working groups will develop the specifics across aircraft categories.

Beyond the equipment mandate, the bill tightens ATC training standards, directs improvements to the FAA’s safety culture, and focuses specifically on the DCA airspace environment.

Sponsors include House T&I Chair Sam Graves, Ranking Member Rick Larsen, Armed Services Chair Mike Rogers, and Ranking Member Adam Smith. NBAA has been supportive since introduction.

The bill now goes to the Senate. For operators, the details that matter most will come out of those working groups, particularly how the compliance requirements get structured for Part 91, Part 91K, and Part 135 operators respectively.

FAA Transitions to New NOTAM System

In the early hours of April 18, the FAA shut down the U.S. NOTAM System (in operation since 1985) and completed the cutover to the new NOTAM Management Service.

Operators flying that morning likely noticed nothing different. The NOTAM format stayed the same, distribution through ForeFlight, Garmin, and other third-party providers continued without interruption, and the FAA recommended continued use of the FNS search page during the transition window itself.

In January 2023, a corrupted file in the legacy system triggered a nationwide ground stop (the first since September 11, 2001) that delayed over 10,000 flights and canceled more than 1,300. The FAA began developing a replacement not long after. The new NMS is cloud-based, fault-tolerant, and built with redundancy and disaster recovery as core requirements.

What doesn’t change yet: NOTAM format and the volume of notices. Automatic prioritization and structural improvements to how NOTAMs are written and organized are still on the roadmap. The infrastructure to support those changes is now in place.

EBACE 2026 Canceled

The European Business Aviation Convention and Exhibition, the industry’s main European trade show held each June in Geneva, was canceled on April 14. EBAA cited insufficient momentum to deliver a viable event.

EBAA and NBAA ended their joint partnership in 2025, leaving EBAA to run the show independently. They weren’t able to build enough exhibitor and attendee commitment to make the June edition work.

Context: Aero Friedrichshafen runs April 22–25. ILA Berlin runs June 10–14. Farnborough is July 20–24. Exhibitor budget and attendee attention in Europe are spread across a full calendar, and EBACE was competing in that environment without its longtime co-organizer.

Whether EBAA rebuilds the show in a new format or replaces it with something different is still unclear. For operators doing international work in Europe, the cross-border networking and regulatory access that EBACE provided doesn’t automatically transfer to other events.

American Airlines Begins Code-Share Agreement with TLC Jet

On April 14, American Airlines announced a partnership with TLC Jet that allows AAdvantage members to earn miles on private jet charter flights.

TLC Jet is a Part 135 operator built out of TLC Aviation, backed by 313 Equity Partners. It was co-founded by Justin Firestone, whose background runs through Marquis Jet Partners, Asia Jet, and an early role at Wheels Up. TLC Jet expanded its certificate through the acquisition of Privaira.

American now joins Delta in a formal private aviation alignment. Delta controls 95% of Wheels Up. American chose a partnership rather than an ownership stake, but the strategic logic is the same: keep high-value travelers inside the loyalty ecosystem regardless of how they’re flying.

The implications for the market are real. The two largest U.S. legacy carriers have both committed to private aviation through their loyalty programs. That changes the competitive environment for standalone fractional and card operators, whose value proposition has historically included staying clear of airline loyalty structures entirely.

Whether mileage accrual actually moves buying decisions is the open question. But look at the structure: a Part 135 operator co-founded by someone with deep fractional and card experience, now connected to an airline loyalty program with over 100 million members. That’s a distribution reach no fractional program has ever had access to. The private jet market is getting less isolated from commercial aviation’s customer relationships, and both Delta and American are betting that the loyalty bridge matters.

It will be worth watching how NetJets, Flexjet, and Wheels Up respond. If the airline-affiliated programs start capturing first-time private flyers through loyalty redemption, that changes the top-of-funnel economics for everybody else in the space.

Fuel: Up, Up, and Away!

Jet-A prices rose significantly this week on the realization that Iran is still keen to keep a strangle hold on the world’s oil supply, and are now at levels that are significantly impacting operations.

According to Aviation Research Group U.S. data from a survey of more than 200 FBOs, the national average for April came in at $8.63 per gallon, up $1.77 from March and up $2.03 compared to a year ago. As of April 17, GlobalAir’s aggregation across 3,241 reporting FBOs showed a national average of $7.80 per gallon. The Central region was the low end at $6.64. The Southern and Western regions were running around $9.37.

The spread between regions and between individual FBOs remains wide. On the same trip, the difference between a fuel stop at a well-positioned Central U.S. airport and a stop in the Northeast or on the West Coast can be $2.50 to $3.00 per gallon. Fuel program participation has more effect on trip cost than it did six months ago.

What it means operationally:

For Part 91 operators, fuel stop planning is worth revisiting. Tankering math that was marginal at $6.00 per gallon is more favorable at $8.50. Operators flying longer missions should be running those numbers on every trip rather than defaulting to prior habits.

For Part 135 and charter operators, trip pricing is getting updated more frequently. Fuel surcharges are getting scrutiny from clients who have watched prices move this fast over a short window. Operators with fuel programs locked in earlier in the year are better positioned than those buying retail.

If your operating cost model was built on early 2026 fuel assumptions, it needs to be revisited. The average is up more than $2.00 per gallon year-over-year, and the near-term direction depends on how quickly Hormuz supply chains normalize, which is not yet clear.

Masters Week: Traffic and What It Shows In The Tea Leaves

The Masters ran April 9–12, with the departure wave clearing through Monday the 13th.

Going in, Augusta Regional Airport was expecting over 2,100 private jet arrivals for the week. NetJets alone projected 775 movements, up from 580 in 2025 and 430 in 2024. NetJets has reportedly proposed a $50–100 million terminal expansion at AGS based on that growth trajectory.

The actuals: 1,417 total private jet arrivals, per WingX data. Still 15 times AGS’s average weekly total. But below the pre-event forecast of 1,615, and a slight decline from 1,441 during Masters week last year. NetJets captured 378 of those arrivals, a 27% share of total traffic.

The airport closed one runway and adjacent taxiway for aircraft parking, added pavement for additional planes, and operators ran on-site operations across multiple regional airports. FlexJet set up a private terminal at Thomson-McDuffie. Wheels Up had a hospitality operation near the course. VistaJet hosted members at a branded space. For the major fractional and card operators, the Masters has become a client retention and acquisition event as much as it is an operational exercise.

The gap between forecast and actual is probably not a clean market signal on its own. Easter fell early this year, which may have shifted some arrival traffic into the prior week. One data point doesn’t establish a trend.

What the trajectory does show is the degree to which event-driven private aviation has become a real and growing part of the market’s behavior. The client base flying into Augusta is the same demographic making fractional ownership and managed aircraft decisions. How that group travels to the Kentucky Derby on May 2, to Sun Valley in July, and to other high-concentration events will give a clearer read on whether the top of the market is holding steady or pulling back on discretionary travel.

Broader Activity: Week 15 Flight Data

Global private jet departures for the week rebounded after the Easter lull. Total worldwide departures came in at approximately 82,000, a 6% year-over-year increase and a 15% jump week-over-week.

The U.S. led. North America recorded over 34,000 fractional and charter flights, with domestic Part 91K and Part 135 operations at approximately 33,700, a 17% year-over-year increase. California and Texas both posted double-digit week-over-week gains.

Europe was softer, down about 3% year-over-year, with Germany down 24%. The Middle East recorded fewer than 400 fractional and charter flights, a 57% year-over-year decline. South America was up 41%.

Also on the Radar

Reports surfaced April 13 that United CEO Scott Kirby pitched a merger concept with American Airlines to senior government officials. The carriers are not confirmed to be in active talks, and the regulatory environment for legacy carrier consolidation is difficult. It’s worth noting because if it advances, the effect on corporate travel buyers (and on clients who use private aviation when commercial options get more complicated) would be real.

That’s The Brief!

The ALERT Act moves to the Senate. The FAA’s NOTAM infrastructure is finally updated. American Airlines has decided private aviation loyalty is worth buying into. And fuel prices have moved far enough, fast enough, to change the operating cost math.

The Week in One Sentence: The ALERT Act passed the House, the FAA completed its NOTAM system cutover, EBACE was canceled, American Airlines entered the private jet market through TLC Jet, and fuel prices moved up sharply enough to require operators to revisit their trip planning and budget assumptions.