Practical, independent writing on buying, owning and flying private.
Business-jet flight attendants train for far more than polished service: fire, smoke, medical events, ditching, evacuation, food safety and the oddities of each cabin. The job is often optional by regulation on smaller jets, but the training is built around the moment when the pilots are busy and the cabin has to act.
A business-jet galley has to fit a refrigerator, ovens and a coffee machine into the space of a wardrobe, survive crash loads and run on aircraft power. What is inside, what it weighs, and what a flight attendant can really cook.
On the smallest jets the toilet hides under a seat cushion. On the largest there is a stand-up shower with its own water tank. How private-jet lavatories work, what they cost, and why a shower is still rare even on the most expensive aircraft.
VIP airliners carry bedrooms, cinemas, gyms and, on Air Force One, a medical suite that can serve as an operating room. Some of the most famous rooms never existed at all. A guide to what is documented, what is only reported, and what was only ever a rendering.
Private-jet service can mean caviar, flowers and favorite coffee. It can also mean a parrot’s lunch, 30 Happy Meals for 15 children, or a landing stop for a dog that wants fresh air.
Take a 250-seat airliner, remove the seats, and hand it to a completion centre with a $150 million budget. The result has bedrooms with en-suites, a boardroom, a gym, and a range that reaches almost anywhere on Earth non-stop.
Gulfstream's flagship is 57 feet of cabin split into up to five rooms, with a shower, a bed, a full galley, and the largest windows in business aviation. A room-by-room tour, with the numbers.
