Engineers have started analyzing boundary layer transition data collected by the space shuttle Discovery as it streaked over the Gulf of Mexico to its Mar. 28 landing at the Kennedy Space Center, adding a post-flight benefit to the 13-day mission that could one day be used by vehicles returning from the Moon.
USAF Maj. Gen. Michael C. Gould has been nominated for promotion to lieutenant general and appointment as superintendent of the U.S. Air Force Academy at Colorado Springs. He has been director of operations and plans at Headquarters U.S. Transportation Command, Scott AFB, Ill. Maj. Gen. Stephen P. Mueller has been appointed director of the Air Component Coordination Element of ACC in Kabul, Afghanistan. He was director of operational capability requirements/deputy chief of staff for operations, plans and requirements at USAF Headquarters at the Pentagon.
Randy Babbitt, President Barack Obama’s nominee to be the 16th administrator of the FAA, is by necessity a man in a hurry. The length of his term is five years, but time will pass quickly because there is so much to do. Nobody knows this better than Babbitt himself (see p. 34). Babbitt faces two big challenges: fielding the first elements of NextGen, the radically modernized air traffic control system for the mid-21st century; and repairing the FAA’s fractured labor relations, particularly with the National Air Traffic Controllers Assn. (Natca).
Boeing is working on a fix to a signal processing system on its first GPS IIF satellite. Launch has repeatedly slipped, but is now set for November, says Craig Cooning, vice president of Boeing Space and Intelligence Systems. Lockheed Martin, meanwhile, has completed 61 of 71 preliminary design reviews under the GPS III contract it won over Boeing nearly a year ago. A final system design review is slated for next month. The first GPS III is expected to launch in 2014. Eight satellites are included in the first block, with more expected with future enhancements.
In the next 18 months, airline IT security departments will be focused on complying with the new Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard, according to the SITA Global Airline IT Security Survey 2009. Major credit card companies—American Express, Discover, JCB, Master Card Worldwide and Visa International—devised the new standard after incurring the loss of millions as a result of “fraud, breaches and other vulnerabilities,” according to Mark Prince, SITA director of consulting for security, voice and convergence.
Eurocopter has increased its stake in Japan’s Euroheli to 90% by acquiring the bulk of Itochu Corp.’s holdings; the latter retains 10%. Euroheli staff and activities were folded into Eurocopter Japan at the start of the month. Eurocopter says it has a 57% market share in the civil and parapublic sectors in Japan with 360 in-service rotorcraft. The military operates three EC225 VIPs with EC135 training helicopters to be added. Eurocopter also is trying to convince Japan to buy the NH90.
Turkey’s ESAS holding company and TUIfly have become big investors in Air Berlin as it struggles to regain financial footing by reducing debt and focusing on cost control and profitability after suffering a €75-million ($100 million) loss last year. Air Berlin says it and TUIfly will form a strategic partnership for European and domestic flights, starting Oct. 1.
Michael Mecham (East Hartford, Conn.), Robert Wall (Geneva)
Demonstration flights are revealing that biofuels have a higher energy content than conventional Jet-A kerosene and offer the promise that future jet engines could be more fuel efficient and less polluting than the “next generation” engines currently under development. With that promise, commercial and military aviation could become the industrial world’s leader in shifting to non-petroleum-based fuels to reduce dependence on foreign suppliers and address persistent environmental issues, particularly the role carbon dioxide (CO2) plays in global warming.
Outgoing Pentagon acquisitions chief John Young has fired a parting shot at the Government Accountability Office (GAO), taking serious issue with the agency’s assessment of cost overruns in the Defense Dept. GAO’s report says the Pentagon has racked up $296 billion in cost growth on 96 programs. Young says the number is “misleading, out-of-date and largely irrelevant.” In a Mar.
Boeing has turned to Times Aerospace Korea (TAK) to lead design and development of a wing kit to extend the range of the 2,000-lb. version of the Joint Direct Attack Munition (JDAM ER). The Korean air force is one of 22 international customers for JDAM, which is a low-cost guidance kit that turns unguided, free-fall bombs into accurately guided “smart” weapons. The Boeing-funded effort will increase the bomb’s range to about 50 naut. mi.—a 35-naut.-mi. jump. TAK is to co-develop, test and field the wing kit, which is expected to take 40 months.
First-quarter 2009 delivery rates show Boeing Commercial Airplanes (BCA) has rebounded from the effects of last year’s machinists strike, but the company has not found a way to sell airplanes in a worldwide recession. First-quarter deliveries reached 121, six more than in 2008 and 15 more than 2007, which mostly reflects a continued buildup in the 737 production line. That factory delivered 91 aircraft in the first quarter compared to 87 in 2008 and 83 in 2007.
A method of quickly simulating and testing components and software for “plug and play” tactical satellites that can be put together in a matter of days has been developed by Albuquerque, N.M.-based PnP Innovations. Based on the Air Force Research Laboratory’s Space Plug and Play Avionics (SPA) standards, the company’s structural panels contain embedded power and data routers as well as mounting positions for PnP sensors and processors.
The U.S. Air Force says it plans to issue a final request for proposals for the Transformational Satellite (TSAT) program in late April. This could, however, change with the issuance of the Pentagon’s budget to the White House Office of Management and Budget, which is expected to take place soon. TSAT was among a list of potential program kills drafted as the Pentagon seeks to cut spending.
Jane Calderwood has been named vice president-government and political affairs for Washington-based Airports Council International-North America . She was vice president of Brown and Co., also in Washington.
Korean Air budget subsidiary Jin Air is branching out internationally with plans to fly to Bangkok and Macao starting in October. The airline proposes to expand to 16 international routes by 2011, serving Southeast Asia, China and Japan. Jin Air has three aircraft and has announced plans to lease two Boeing 737-800s this year.
E-GEOS, a geospatial information service venture founded by Telespazio and Italian space agency ASI to market imagery data and products from Italy’s Cosmo-SkyMed submetric radar constellation and other sources, has signed a contract with 4C Satellite Images & Technologies, an arm of U.S.-based 4C Controls. The €180-million ($234-million) deal will give Luxembourg-based 4C Satellite exclusive rights to CosmoSkyMed in North Africa, the Middle East and Southeast Asia.
The International Air Transport Assn. says all its members have passed a required safety audit, but the group’s membership list is missing 21 airlines that did not meet audit deadlines and had to leave.
German researchers say aerodynamic condensation trails formed by airflow over an aircraft’s wing at high altitude need to be factored into climate models being developed to determine the effect of air traffic on global warming.
Pratt & Whitney Rocketdyne is studying a small, liquid-propellant vehicle for nanosatellite launches, says President Jim Maser. ARDE of Carlstadt, N.J., a pressure-vessel and propellant-tank specialist that Rocketdyne acquired last November, will help in the research and development effort. Maser says the project is part of a growth-through-innovation drive, but adds that it is too preliminary to describe in detail.
A revised defense acquisition reform bill approved by the Senate Armed Services Committee has dropped a total ban on contractors advising the Pentagon on weapon systems that they are also building or developing. The legislation, introduced by Sens. Carl Levin (D-Mich.) and John McCain (R-Ariz.), aims to tackle the dual problems of cost overruns and delays by requiring more systems engineering and testing at the beginning stages of a weapon system’s acquisition. President Barack Obama endorsed the bill (AW&ST Mar. 9, p. 21).
Boeing has demonstrated deployment of a containerized solid-state laser weapon system to reduce risk for the U.S. Army’s truck-mounted High Energy Laser Technology Demonstrator, planned for counter-rocket, artillery and mortar test firings in 2013-15. The company-funded Redeployable High-Energy Laser Systems (RHELS) packages a solid-state laser, thermal management, beam control and operator station in a 40-ft. cargo container. Boeing has demo’d the ability to transport the laser by semi-trailer and have it ready to fire within 8 hr.
