Piper Announces Fleet Sale to UND

The sales staff at Vero Beach, Fla.-based Piper Aircraft are celebrating at this year’s Sun ’n' Fun airshow in Lakeland, Fla. Today they announced the sale of 112 training aircraft to the UND Aerospace Foundation, which provides aircraft and training services to the University of North Dakota John D. Odegard School of Aerospace Sciences.

Deliveries of single-engine Archer TXs and multi-engine Seminoles will begin in the fourth quarter of 2016 and stretch out across the next eight years, the company told AIN. The contract value is estimated to be at least $40 million, based on today’s pricing of a standard equipped Piper Seminole at $697,000 and the ArcherTX, which starts at $345,000.

Students at the University of North Dakota’s School of Aerospace Sciences, who routinely fly more than 125,000 hours a year, will use the aircraft. The Archers and Seminoles are equipped with Garmin G1000 avionics and an autopilot. Piper is offering a flight-school interior with ergonomic seating and sidewalls hand crafted and fitted with heavy-duty vinyl and wear-resistant leather to maximize durability. The Archer is powered by the 180-hp Lycoming 0-360-A4M piston engine and offers 128-knot (237-km/h) cruise speed, while the Seminole has two 180-hp Lycoming engines and lists a maximum takeoff weight of 3,800 pounds, a max speed of 202 knots and ceiling of 15,000 feet.