Starting this week, NASA will use its Mars Odyssey orbiter to listen for signals from the Phoenix lander, which probably froze during the Martian winter after studying a site in Mars’s arctic latitudes for signs of water. Phoenix touched down on May 25, 2008, and its last transmission was received in early November of that year. It is considered highly unlikely that the solar-powered lander survived winter.
In the latest chapter of the on-again, off-again U.S. Air Force program to upgrade avionics on the C-130 airlifter fleet, service officials say the once-dead project is now funded and will move forward.
Europe’s second Automated Transfer Vehicle, designed to supply and reboost the International Space Station, has begun post-integration functional and flight readiness tests at Astrium’s Bremen, Germany, plant. The vehicle, christened Johannes Kepler, will be shipped to the launch site in Kourou, French Guiana, in the second half of the year, following final tests, in preparation for a November launch to the ISS.
France has ordered a fourth Harfang medium-altitude long-endurance (MALE) unmanned aerial vehicle from EADS. The €33.7-million ($49-million) purchase, which includes a third control system, was made under a procedure put in place to accelerate critical weapons procurement. The Harfang—known as the Interim MALE UAV—is based on the Israel Aerospace Industries’ (IAI) Heron. The new vehicle will be delivered this summer to the Adour squadron in southwestern France for training and national air defense duty.
Erich Staake (see photo) has become chairman of the supervisory board of Mitteldeutsche Flughafen AG , Leipzig, Germany. Others appointed to the board are Prof. Georg Frank and Saxon State Minister Sven Morlok. Staake also is chairman of the board at Duisburger Hafen AG. He succeeds Willi Hermsen, who has resigned.
Lockheed Martin is bracing for a cut in numbers of F-35s to be produced from Fiscal 2011-15 as the Pentagon moves Joint Strike Fighter funds from procurement to development in a bid to get the delayed program back on track. But the company is hoping the Defense Dept. will push for a “buy to budget” approach so that, if the program meets its flight-test productivity and production cost-reduction targets, the services will be able to add back some of the aircraft deferred to later years.
One of the two Soyuz lifeboats in the International Space Station will be moved to the newest module on the Russian end of the orbiting laboratory, following a spacewalk Jan. 14 to prepare the combination research module/docking port to receive it.
BAE Systems artist Dave Jantaush produced this computer-generated scenario of an insertion of troops and equipment into a Southwest Asian environment occupied by insurgents armed with both guided weapons and a wide-range of small arms and dumb weapons like the rocket-propelled grenade. To illustrate the story that begins on p. 38, BAE Systems artists designed a collage of photographs and computer images to depict the same event as seen from the ground.
For U.S. helicopter pilots in particular, Afghanistan is a new battlefield with new threats. And as troops and intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance resources pour into the theater, rotary-wing use will quickly escalate.
The article “Solid Effort” (AW&ST Nov. 23, 2009, p. 54) describes the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency’s effort to build a new Advanced Solid Rocket stating, “The point of the project is to cut costs. The ASR would lift . . . a third less than its predecessor M-V, at around a third of the cost per launch.” Lifting one-third less payload at one-third of the cost sounds like proportional shrinking, not cost-saving.
Boeing flew the second 787 back to its Everett, Wash., site from Boeing Field in nearby Seattle on Jan 14 following the discovery of “small bits of debris” in the fuel system. The aircraft, which was originally expected to have rejoined the flight test program earlier this month following its first flight on Dec. 22, will have its fuel system flushed out to remove any contaminates in a “routine process” using facilities that are not available at Boeing Field, says the manufacturer.
The analogy made by Pierre Sparaco in his column “Disappointing Tankers” between Toyota and EADS is totally correct (AW&ST Jan. 4, p. 51). To avoid having EADS do to the U.S. aerospace industry what Toyota did to Detroit’s Big Three, every KC-135 and KC-10 should be replaced by a Boeing tanker.
The Lockheed Martin Space Based Infrared System (Sbirs) ground segment has achieved two milestones. During a “day-in-the-life” test, officials validated the performance of the ground system for operational use with the Sbirs geosynchronous spacecraft, which will be delivered in late 2010 in preparation for launch. The 17-day test included exercises that will support launch and early checkout of the satellite once in orbit. This led to the System Integration Readiness Review.
Hot demand for high-speed Internet access in remote and rural areas of Canada is prompting operators to turn to satellite-based links. OmniGlobe Networks, a Montreal-based provider of very-small-aperture terminals and voice-over-Internet protocol services, says it is in advanced discussions with several suppliers to buy, launch and operate a new medium-sized Ka-band satellite. The satellite, Canuk-1, is to be launched in the third quarter of 2013.
The University of Illinois last week commmissioned a new advanced bird tracking system using avian radars at Seattle-Tacoma International Airport. The system, deployed by the FAA-designated Center of Excellence for Airport Technology at the university, is now “live.” It provides wildlife managers patrolling airport bird hazard “hot spots” with access to real-time data from avian radars. Displays of bird activity on and around an airport are displayed on laptop computers as overlays on Google Earth maps.
Sherman Mullin in his letter “Innovation Examined” asserts that the shaft-driven lift-fan propulsion system leading to the F-35 was invented by two engineers in the back room, whom he managed from 1990-94 (AW&ST Nov. 9, 2009, p. 10). I assume he means the two Lockheed engineers who hold a 1993 patent. Unfortunately, this was only a refinement of earlier work. Their patent (No. 5,209,428) references a prior one (No. 2,918,232) by Alexander Lippisch, dated 1959. It shows an aircraft with an aft-mounted engine driving a long shaft leading to a front-mounted lift fan.
Delta has finalized a deal to acquire nine MD-90 aircraft from China Eastern Airlines. Delta said it will take delivery of the nine aircraft from February to July, and this year also will be receiving two MD-90s it previously acquired from Boeing Capital. That will give Delta 28 MD-90s, which it said will be second only to the 29 operated by Saudi Arabian Airlines. The new acquisitions are not being used to increase capacity: a Delta spokesman said the MD-90 growth will be offset by MD-80 retirements and CRJ fleet reductions.
Heath Tecna, a U.S. maker of aircraft interior components, will supply Mitsubishi Aircraft with parts for the Mitsubishi Regional Jet. The company, based in Bellingham, Wash., will make interior linings, galley units, lavatories, emergency escape slides and the waste and water system for the MRJ. Mitsubishi says it has also contracted with EADS unit Eurocopter to supply baggage, service and passenger doors.
Attack, not defense, will reshape electronic warfare. A magazine filled with electron pulses, information scrambling data streams and invasive algorithms may arm the Next-Generation Jammer (NGJ).
Qatar Airways has put its synthetic fuel program on a dual-track with its announcement last week of a joint move to develop and produce a sustainable biofuel. The carrier, together with Qatar Science & Technology Park and Qatar Petroleum, says it will start seriously exploring biomass-to-liquid projects.
Opposing camps within the U.K. Defense Ministry are debating the extent of procurement reform, a fight that advocates of implementing radical change previously lost.
Long, long ago in a galaxy far, far away, accountants and lawyers were waging war against the peace-loving and productive engineers and entrepreneurs. They were outflanked by documentation and the bottom line with coordinated frontal assaults of overhead, which were eating up any extra hours designated for design improvements and visionary thinking. The planet of Economics 101 was buckling under the stress and unable to sustain the large amount of paper that was being generated.
USN Rear Adm. (lower half) Joseph P. Aucoin has been appointed commander of Carrier Strike Group Three, Bremerton, Wash. He was deputy director of the Air Warfare Div. in the Office of the Chief of Naval Operations in Washington.
MDA Corp.’s unmanned air systems, too, uses the IAI Heron, in this case for a Royal Australian Air Force mission. Flight operations are now officially underway from Kandahar Airfield in Afghanistan, where is it supplying the RAAF with intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance information directly to ground commanders in real time.
Flavio Renfer has been named Frankfurt-based vice president-business development and customer relations of European Cargo Services . He was director for Western Europe for Delta Air Lines.
