A lifelong aviation enthusiast who joined&nbsp;AIN&nbsp;in 2007, Curt came to&nbsp;the publication&nbsp;from the broadcast industry where he was a national science and technology television reporter and producer. He writes on the FBO field, aviation finance, and sustainable aviation and occasionally contributes to&nbsp;AIN&nbsp;sister publication&nbsp;Business Jet Traveler. Curt was a member of the AINtv reporting staff that won the 2008 Aerospace Journalist of the Year award for Best Airshow Daily. That same year, he was a finalist for another AJOYA award. He earned an AJOYA for Best Business Aviation Submission in 2018 and was a finalist in that category in 2021. He received the National Air Transportation Association’s&nbsp; Aviation Journalist Award in 2012 and won a Pegasus Sapphire Business Aviation Award for outstanding journalism in 2021.
Before joining AIN, Curt worked with&nbsp;Consumer Reports’ television division, CRTV, and for several local television news staffs. An honors graduate of the State University of New York at Stony Brook, he earned a master’s degree in broadcast journalism from Boston University in 1995. Curt lives in New York State with his wife and two young sons.

Business Aviation Services Editor

Curt Epstein

This year marks multiple milestones for Prince Aviation, a full-service company in Serbia that traces its roots back to the former Yugoslavia. The business aviation services firm started 35 years ago as a small aircraft operator based in a hangar it rented from Yugoslav Airlines at Belgrade Nikola Tesla Airport.
In addition, 2025 is the 20th anniversary of the start of Prince Aviation’s maintenance division, which the company first developed to handle its own aircraft fleet. Over time, the company gained valuable experience and a unique perspective as it extended its support outside its own organization.
“It put us in a really good mentality and approach that we are respecting the customer and their operations,” said Djordje Petrović, the company’s COO. “The maintenance facility from that moment was developing a wider scope.” The facility—now a full-service MRO—received its EASA Part 145 maintenance certificate in 2012.
Last September, the company opened a new 32,290-sq-ft maintenance hangar next to its original 8,600-sq-ft facility. It is equipped with a heated floor, climate control, and—like many aircraft hangars—a “Big Ass Fan.” “We had a couple of occasions of our technicians going to the United States to support some projects, and they saw (the fan) and were slightly jealous, so when we were building the facility, we wanted to please them,” joked Petrović.
Now with the ability to accommodate 15 aircraft at a time, this has allowed Prince to quadruple its capacity to more than 100 aircraft projects a year. “This is one of the biggest improvements that we made,” Petrović told AIN. “With the previous facility, the slot availability was around two and a half to three months. With the addition of the new facility, we have shortened that period to a one-month backlog.” He added that 80% of his company’s clientele are repeat customers.
While the new hangar can handle ultra-long-range business jets, the MRO’s focus is on Cessna Citations, and it recently expanded into legacy Dassault Falcons such as the 50, 900, and 2000 models, mirroring the composition of its Cessna/Dassault charter fleet.
Among its capabilities are avionics upgrades; the company is an authorized dealer and installation center for Collins Aerospace, Garmin, and Mid-Continent Instruments and Avionics. To demonstrate its expertise, last year it performed a glass cockpit retrofit on a Citation CJ—the oldest jet in its fleet—installing Garmin’s G600 displays and GTN 750 touchscreens.
Prince also performs satcom installations, with its venerable CJ serving last May as the global premiere platform for the Collins IRT NX system. It followed that up in January with the first-ever installation on a Citation XLS, also one of its own fleet aircraft, which it showed off at Aero Friedrichshafen.
In terms of structural repairs, the company recently performed one of the most involved projects on a Citation outside of the Textron subsidiary’s Wichita factory. It involved the replacement of the entire belly skin on an XLS due to corrosion caused by a lavatory fluid leak. Requiring 7,000 hours of work, the job involved the complete removal of the jet’s interior, engines, and wings, along with reinforcement of the pressurized fuselage.
The facility can also handle cabin refurbishments, and a rented third hangar on the field (6,500 sq ft) is configured as a paint shop for the interior and exterior painting of aircraft up to midsize jets. Among its authorizations, Prince is a Pratt &amp; Whitney designated maintenance facility, one of seven in Europe, as well as a Textron Aviation authorized non-destructive testing facility.
In terms of AOG, Prince has a dedicated team with 24/7 dispatch and has sent its technicians to Asia Pacific and South Africa. Depending on the urgency of the situation, the company can use its own aircraft fleet for transport, and it maintains a spare parts inventory of €2.5 million.
Because Serbia is not a member of the EU, the company employs two full-time customs agents to handle the acceptance and shipping of parts and supply packages. For AOG response, the MRO has dedicated customs pre-cleared toolkits for technicians to grab and go without delay. It aims for dispatch within half an hour of receiving a call.
To maintain its safety standards as it expands, Prince recently announced that it has become the first business jet company in Europe to implement Snap-on’s automated Level 5 Tool Control System for managing aircraft maintenance tools.
The MRO has a staff of 110 employees, including 70 full-time technicians, half of whom have been with the company for a decade or more. While the labor pool of mechanics is tight throughout most of the industry, Prince has a strong pipeline with its own EASA Part 147 training school, and it also accepts 10 to 15 apprentices a month from the nearby aerospace vocational high school. The company has established a unique mentorship program for its technicians nearing retirement age and beyond. They are assigned the less complicated maintenance jobs so they can focus on overseeing and instructing their younger, newly-hired colleagues.

News and issues about aviation maintenance, repair and overhaul (MRO), covering all segments of the aviation industry; and modifications for aircraft and engines. Subjects include product support of aircraft, engines and avionics, MRO company mergers, acquisitions, announcements and personnel, Airworthiness Directives, Supplemental Type Certificate approvals and other topics.

MRO Profile: Serbia's Prince Aviation Poised for Growth

Serbian MRO is rapidly expanding its facilities and capabilities

Serbian MRO provider Prince Aviation has expanded its capacity and its capabilities over the past year.

2024 Corporate Aviation Leadership Summit

Kerry Lynch

News and information on safety procedures and concerns.

News and issues relating to business, corporate and private aviation, primarily regarding turbine-engine-powered airplanes and helicopters. Subjects include aircraft, engines, maintenance, operations, personnel, acquisitions, accidents, safety, security, and training.

Four industry leaders highlight how they’ve used data, implemented SMS

Roundtable: Maintenance’s Next Horizons with Data, SMS

Program eases maintenance planning and management

Software Designer To Debut Maintenance Manager at CJP

Jessica Reed

News and developments about airplanes, helicopters and unmanned air vehicles used in all varieties of operations, including airlines, military, business, commercial, general aviation and private.

News and developments about everything that goes into the cabin of an aircraft, from floor coverings to headliners, with a special emphasis on in-flight entertainment, communications and other electronics for passengers. If it is in the cabin of an aircraft, it’s covered here.

VIP Completions collaborated with Ukrainian architecture firm Yodezeen

VIP Completions Delivers G550 Refurbishment in 8 Weeks

Chad Trautvetter

Bombardier-authorized facility approved to work on European-registered aircraft

West Coast MRO ACI Jet Obtains EASA Part 145 Approval

Matt Thurber

News and issues relating to the aerospace industry that are related to the science, engineering and business of flight in space involving civil, industrial and military applications, and similar topics related to flight in the atmosphere of the Earth that are not covered more directly by other AINonline subject channels. In other words, both astronautical and aeronautical subjects, except for those aeronautical topics that are specifically covered elsewhere on this website.

News and issues relating to international air transport and cargo carriers, national airlines and regional airlines, including aircraft, engines, personnel, acquisitions, accidents, safety, security and training.

Company’s products equip airline, business aviation, and military aircraft

Aerox Acquires Gas Cylinder Manufacturer N23D Services

News and issues concerning general aviation, specifically airplanes and helicopters powered by piston and alternative engines (i.e., non-turbine powered aircraft). Subjects include aircraft, engines, personnel, acquisitions, accidents, safety, security and training.

System will help discover problems that can then be addressed by human experts

Savvy’s Anomaly Detection Uses AI To Analyze Engines

Amy Wilder

Company offers incentives to encourage early scheduled maintenance

Desert Jet Advises Early Maintenance To Avoid Delays

News and developments about aircraft engines, including turbofan, turboprop, turboshaft and piston.

More In Maintenance and Modifications