In response to your articles “Evolving Enhancement” and Anti-Aging Program,” on efficiency and upgrade programs (AW&ST Mar. 24, p. 43; Mar. 31, p. 40), aerodynamic, structural and system improvements as well as weight savings have places in any effort to achieve gains in operational efficiency, and cost-effective improvements are to be applauded.
Retirements will overtake deliveries in the worldwide military fleet in the coming decade as more capable models replace older ones, AeroStrategy’s Hal Chrisman told an audience at Aviation Week’s MRO conference in Fort Lauderdale, Fla., last week. The current inventory of 39,113 aircraft has rotorcraft as the biggest slice of the pie at 37%, followed by fighter/attack and trainers (tied at 14%), light/medium transports (8%) and smaller mixes of attack helos, utility, special mission, tankers and heavy transports.
On June 17, the FAA is scheduled to begin operating an upgraded version of its Traffic Flow Management Processing Center (TFMPC) at the William J. Hughes Technical Center in Pomona, N.J. The facility will replace the agency’s Enhanced Traffic Management System (ETMS), now at the Volpe National Transportation Systems Center, in Cambridge, Mass.
Qantas is testing millimeter-wave security technology at Melbourne Airport’s domestic terminal. The ProVision Portal is able to scan and identify all objects concealed on or carried by passengers. Travelers walk into the unit and stand in a designated spot for 3 sec. with arms raised, then leave. “The millimeter waves used to generate the individual’s image are not invasive or harmful. The image created simply resembles an outline of the person and indicates the position of any foreign object,” says Geoffrey Askew, Qantas Group’s general manager of security.
NASA’s approach to developing technologies for its ambitious human space-exploration goals could cause problems down the road because it is too shortsighted to support the effort over its 30-year span. A National Research Council (NRC) panel finds that the space agency is not budgeting enough for operational-environment testing as it lays out its program. It warns that NASA is placing so much emphasis on a return to the Moon that needed technologies may not be available for subsequent exploration of Mars.
Network-centric operations envisioned by the Pentagon continue to defy description, not least because the emergence of new technologies is constantly demanding redefinition of the concept. Predictions about the effectiveness of network-centric warfare span the spectrum from creating a perfect victory to triggering a rapid, cascading collapse.
Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport has decided to defer implementing a registered traveler (RT) program and instead will spend $25 million to add more security lanes in its North and South terminals. A bid for an RT pilot was originally offered last February. The airport will now add three new lanes at Terminal North’s T gates and another four lanes in Terminal South, bringing its total lanes to 32. New screening equipment will also be installed.
Dublin-based Air Contractors has acquired Paris-based European Air Post (EAP), considerably expanding its overnight parcel express, passenger, leasing and engineering/spares support activities. EAP operates 16 aircraft out of Paris Charles de Gaulle Airport. Air Contractors, which is controlled by Compagnie Maritime Belge and 3P Air Freighters, owns 25 aircraft and operates another 18.
Robert Wall (Sao Paulo and Sao Jose dos Campos, Brazil)
Rising competition in the regional jet sector, changing airline economics, and sustained demand for business aviation have Embraer reevaluating how to develop its product line beyond the series of recent launches.
Lockheed Martin will build the next geostationary satellite for the Broadcast Satellite System Corp. of Japan under a contract announced Apr. 15. BSAT-3b, a 1-4-kw.-class spacecraft, is scheduled to be launched in 2010. It will feature 12 Ku-band channels designed to provide high-definition direct broadcast services across Japan, and use Lockheed Martin’s A2100A bus. Arianespace was handed the launch award on Apr. 11. It was the first commercial satellite win for Lockheed Martin this year, equaling its single-award performance in 2006 and 2007.
Russia and Brazil have signed a wide-ranging defense aerospace cooperation agreement covering potential collaboration in combat aircraft and space launch vehicles, according to local press reports in both countries. The deal was signed by Roberto Mangabeira Unger, Brazil’s minister for strategic affairs, and Valentin Sobolev, the vice president of the Russian Security Council. Russia remains keen to secure a fighter export sale to Brazil.
ESA has contracted with Thales Alenia Space and EADS Astrium to design and build two additional Sentinel spacecraft for the Global Monitoring for Environment and Security network. Thales Alenia received a €305-million ($482-million) award for Sentinel 3, an altimetry and land vegetation monitoring satellite that will ensure continuity with Envisat. Astrium was awarded a €195-million contract for Sentinel 2, a 13-band multispectral optical land imaging spacecraft that will ensure continuity with medium-resolution wide-swath data provided by France’s Spot 5.
NASA will base U.S. resupply of the International Space Station on the untried vehicles of the Commercial Orbital Transportation System (COTS) program, and will not buy cargo services from Russia after the space shuttle fleet retires. U.S. space agency officials are set to begin discussions with Congress this week on continued use of Russia’s Soyuz crew-launch vehicles following the final shuttle flight in 2010. But they won’t ask for permission to keep using Russian Progress vehicles.
AVIATION WEEK has expanded its editorial team with the addition of four reporters. Graham Warwick has been appointed senior editor, responsible for developing and coordinating technology coverage in print and online. Formerly of Flight International, Warwick is an aeronautical engineer by training and succeeds William B. Scott, who retired in 2007. Warwick was with Flight for more than 30 years.
China’s second-largest airline, Air China, aims to carry 40.06 million passengers this year, 15% more than in 2007. Shenzhen Airlines, a second-tier carrier, aims to have 100 aircraft in its fleet by the end of the year, three times as many as at the end of 2005 and representing an annual fleet growth rate of 44%.
Eilif Serck-Hanssen has been appointed chief financial officer of XOjet Inc. , San Carlos, Calif. He was CFO of Eos Airlines Inc. and had been treasurer of US Airways.
When Stephen Finger returned to Pratt & Whitney as president two years ago, the company was capping decades of research by bringing out its geared turbofan (GTF) design for regional and single-aisle jet engines. Japan has now launched the engine with the 70-90-seat Mitsubishi Regional Jet, and Bombardier has named it to power the 110-130-seat CSeries. Those efforts put the GTF on track for first service in 2013. Pratt is a partner in International Aero Engines, whose V2500 powers the Airbus A320 family.
Ronald Smith has become Northern California and Nevada director of Pilatus PC-12 sales for Western Aircraft , Boise, Idaho. He was an Eclipse 500 sales representative for Eclipse Aviation.
The Qantas group is likely to extend its Jetstar budget airline business with further franchisees following the incorporation of a Vietnamese airline as the second Southeast Asian user of the Australian no-frills brand. As four Asia-Pacific aviation groups maneuver for the region’s potentially vast budget airline market, setting up foreign affiliates like players placing pieces on a checkerboard, the Australian airline has become the first to move in heavily populated Vietnam, a country that seems ripe for low-cost aviation.
Steven F. Udvar-Hazy, chairman/CEO of the International Lease Finance Corp., has been named to receive the 2008 Distinguished Achievement Award from the Wings Club of New York, for his accomplishments in the field of aviation and aircraft leasing.
As president of the leading systems supplier for Boeing’s 787 jet, Hamilton Sundstrand’s David P. Hess has had a ringside seat to troubles in the supply chain that have delayed the aircraft’s certification by about 15 months. So it might come as a surprise that he remains a firm believer in the program’s unproven business model.
Douglas Register has been named vice president-service delivery and engineering for United Airlines . He was vice president-information technology service delivery for Blue Cross Blue Shield of Florida.
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BAE Systems is to cut more than 550 engineering and support-related jobs at its Brough and Woodford sites. Brough will bear the brunt of the cuts, losing 450 positions. An additional 134 posts will be cut at Woodford. The company is trying to reduce Brough’s dependency on the Hawk program. Woodford is the focus of the company’s Nimrod MRA4 maritime patrol aircraft program.
