Diamond Aircraft will upgrade the engine in its D-JET very light jet to the Williams FJ33-4A-19 from the -15 version originally planned. The new engine is rated at 1,900 lb. static thrust, compared with its predecessor’s 1,564 lb. In addition, the improved powerplant features reduced specific fuel consumption and a more efficient bleed air system. The engine change, however, will delay customer deliveries of the single-engine D-JET until the second quarter of 2009, says Peter Maurer, Diamond president.
Jim Berberet has become vice president-business development for the Triumph Aftermarket Services Group of Phoenix. He was senior program manager at Nordam.
EADS Astrium will acquire Surrey Satellite Technology Ltd. in a move that should strengthen SSTL’s bid to become a player in the commercial satellite market while reinforcing Astrium’s expertise in the small-satellite sector. Astrium announced last week that it had concluded an agreement to acquire virtually all of SSTL from the University of Surrey, subject to regulatory approval. Included in the sale were the 10% holding of SpaceX and the 5%-plus share owned by management and employees.
The revised schedule Boeing has set for the 787 is the third major change since program slips began last fall, and it puts the company about 15 months behind its original plan for certification and first deliveries.
The U.K. Defense Ministry has finally begun to declassify work carried out on a design for a supersonic multirole fighter intended to replace the Harrier and Tornado strike aircraft. The project dates back to the end of the 1980s and was led by the then-British Aerospace. A full-scale size and shape mockup of the design (left), known as P.125, was built by the company before the project was shelved.
Aerojet engineers will mature U.S. methane-fueled rocket engine technology that could one day be used to lift the Altair lunar lander crew off the Moon’s surface, under a $6.9-million study contract from NASA. During the 21-month contract period, Aerojet will complete evaluation of a 5,500-lb.-thrust pressure-fed engine assembly. Methane is easier to store than liquid hydrogen and much denser, says Aerojet President J. Scott Neish.
U.S. billionaire Leonard Blavatnik is about to take a 18.5% stake in Germany’s second largest airline Air Berlin. Blavatnik’s Access Industries will buy the stake previously held by financially struggling private equity investor Vatas Holdings. Blavatnik will be Air Berlin’s single largest shareholder.
One of the newest analytical tools in use by the U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) is a powerful projection system that displays detailed imagery on a large screen with a higher level of resolution than in movie theaters. Called the High-Definition Projection Array (HDPA), the analysis facility, at Bolling AFB, in Washington, can display multiple images and video feeds at the same time for evaluation.
NASA has extended Pratt & Whitney Rocketdyne’s Common Extensible Cryogenic Engine (CECE) development contract, originally awarded in 2005, to cover a descent engine for the future lunar lander. Pratt is testing a throttleable version of the venerable 13,800-lb.-thrust RL10 for the role. Under CECE, Pratt has demonstrated repeated throttling operability from 100% down to as low as 9.5% of full power. Under the new phase of the contract, Pratt will design, manufacture and test an enhanced injector to support stable combustion at very low thrust.
Italian carrier Air One may add shareholders to strengthen its long-shot efforts to take over rival Alitalia. Two Italian private investors, Giovanni Malagò and Lupo Rattazzi, have announced they may be ready to take a minority stake if primary owner Carlo Toto opens the airline up for capital investments. An injection of €50 million ($78.5 million) is being considered. Meanwhile, Alitalia is still trying to keep Air France-KLM interested in a takeover.
American Airlines is taking a financial beating from stepped-up FAA safety oversight that last week required grounding and re-inspection of wire bundles in its fleet of 300 MD-80 aircraft. Lost revenue from the 1,000 flight cancellations on Apr. 9 alone could run as high as $14.5 million. This figure does not count revenue from passengers rebooked on American or the expenses incurred for accommodating dislocated travelers Apr. 8-11.
Aerojet and Orbital Sciences have conducted the first static test firing of the jettison motor for the Orion Launch Abort System (LAS) being developed by Orbital. The ground test firing at Aerojet’s Sacramento, Calif., facility lasted less than 2 sec. to meet program criteria for the motor, which weighs less than 500 lb. and uses four nozzles. The test sets up the LAS for the first full-scale pad abort test at the Army’s White Sands Missile Range, N.M., before year-end.
Mexicana has been accepted as Oneworld’s next member airline. The carrier will join the alliance within 12-18 months. Mexicana is the first airline to have joined one of the global alliances (Star), then left it (in 2004) and then joined another group.
General Dynamics has finished satellite integration and environmental testing on its GeoEye-1 commercial remote-sensing spacecraft. It will include a sensor for the National Geospatial Intelligence Agency’s NextView program, through which the government buys commercial high-resolution remote-sensing services. The $21-million satellite will be launched Aug. 22.
While it will be great if Sikorsky’s X2 concept proves successful, Arnie Reiner’s letter dinging the V-22 Osprey goes off track (AW&ST Mar. 24, p. 10; Mar. 3, p. 38). The V-22 went through almost four years of being a dead program, thanks to then-Defense Sceretary Dick Cheney. After restoration, it then saw eight years of inadequate R&D funding, as did so many other programs, so the major costs wouldn’t show up until after the 2000 election. Since then, its funding has to take into account the impact of the war on the budget.
NASA and the European Space Agency are rapidly developing a $3-billion outer planets flagship effort that could barnstorm the giant icebergs and subsurface oceans of Jupiter’s moon Europa, or deliver a low-altitude imaging airship and a miniature submarine to probe the methane lakes on Saturn’s moon Titan. Teams from the U.S. and Europe are to meet this week in Vienna to refine Titan/Saturn concepts; a similar definition meeting will be held in Rome Apr. 21-24 to weigh Jupiter/Europa concepts.
NATO has moved several key modernization programs past difficult hurdles, but decisions looming in the coming months will signal whether commitments made at the alliance’s summit will be lasting.
Arinc Inc. has completed an innovative installation of common-use self-service standard (CUSS) check-in kiosks for airline passengers at St. John’s International Airport in Newfoundland. Ten kiosks will be shared initially by Air Canada, Continental and WestJet Airlines. The installation marks the 12th successive deployment of the company’s common-use kiosk technology at a Canadian airport in the last five years. The systems now serve passengers in Canada from Newfoundland to British Columbia.
Airlines are taking a cautious approach toward new flying opportunities under the European Union-U.S. open skies agreement, as the economic outlook is becoming more difficult and concerns over regulatory moves persist.
Sonatest’s CT and CT-G DL (data-logging) ultrasonic thickness gauges take fast, precise wall and coating thickness measurements, according to the company. The models automatically measure and eliminate any coating from wall thickness measurements, allowing users to locate the minutest corrosion and pitting without removing the coating. Measurements are temperature-compensated and users can create and store 64 setups for common testing applications. The time-based B-Scan view enables a cross-section image. The high-speed scan function provides 50 readings per sec.
The FAA may partner with several aerospace companies and airlines to create a NextGen integrated testbed in Florida for a full-scale demonstration, but the airlines are interested in extending the effort to include the New York metropolitan area and Texas.
Boeing’s Air Traffic Management Group Believes funding is no longer in question for either of two key ATC modernization projects—NextGen in the U.S. and the Single European Sky Air Traffic Management Research (Sesar) program in Europe. But the U.S. still has work to do on the organizational structure of NextGen if a systematic approach is going to be taken to usher the new system into existence. Sesar already has a much more well-defined organization to drive research and implementation. “The U.S.
South Korean-based rocket maker Challenge & Space (C&S) plans to make its Chase 10 methane/liquid oxygen-fueled rocket more marketable by developing an “Americanized” version with U.S.-supplied valves and other parts. The move is designed to counter State Dept. roadblocks currently slowing plans for using the motor to power the AirBoss Aerospace Proteus space tourism suborbital vehicle, as well as other potential projects.
