The White House approved creation of a unified combatant command for Africa in the Defense Dept. by the end of 2008. Various numbered air forces in European Command have had the assignment for many years, and have supplied cargo aircraft and surveillance, particularly for disaster relief. However, terrorist groups such as Al Qaeda have been using Africa for training, recruiting and fund-raising for the past several years. Insurgent groups have launched attacks in Algeria, Morocco and Somalia, and threatened other countries such as Kenya and Ethiopia.
Contract discussions are nearly complete for the sale of three Boeing 787-8s and two 737-900ERs to Azerbaijan Airlines. It would become the first carrier in the former Soviet Union to operate both types of airplanes.
Civilian operators at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration satellite-control facility at Suitland, Md., have taken over F-17, the newest Defense Meteorological Satellite Program spacecraft, for operational use worldwide. Launched Nov. 4, 2006, it was the second mission carried by a Delta IV from Vandenberg AFB, Calif., and the first use of that new booster in a direct insertion. F-17 is the second Block 5D-3 built by Lockheed Martin for DMSP and includes a number of system upgrades.
Airline entrepreneur M. Lamar Muse died Feb. 5 in Dallas of lung cancer. He was 86. Muse co-founded Southwest Airlines and served as its first president and CEO from 1970-78 before resigning. Muse was responsible for much of Southwest Airlines' innovative marketing techniques, including flight attendants wearing hot pants and the carrier's "luv" theme. LUV remains the airline's symbol on the New York Stock Exchange. He was an early advocate of deregulation and together with his son Mike, later founded Muse Air, which was eventually bought by Southwest Airlines.
Anish Patel (see photo) has become vice president-business development and strategy for Circor Aerospace Products, Corona, Calif. He was a sales executive for Honeywell and Eaton Aerospace.
THE FAA IS AMENDING REGULATIONS GOVERNING the renewal of mechanics holding an Inspection Authorization (IA). Under current rules, IAs must be renewed every year but the new law would expand this to once every two years. The agency says the change will reduce administrative costs by 50% for both the FAA and the mechanic holding an IA.
The saddest and most frustrating aspect of the FAA's plans to adopt an Age 65 Rule for commercial pilots is about the pilots it won't cover--the ones who turn 60 during the period when the FAA bureaucracy is moving at a glacial pace toward the new standard.
Boeing could soon lose a vital piece of its C-130 Avionics Modernization Program. The U.S. Air Force has issued a stop-work order on upgrades of special operations C-130s, long considered the most urgent need. The move is seen as linked to cost and technical performance problems on the upgrade.
Rockwell Collins is expanding its footprint at Boeing by becoming the primary avionics supplier on the 747-8, building on its important role on the all-new 787. The Cedar Rapids, Iowa-based company will not only supply more of the avionics content on the 747-8 than it does on the 747-400, it will take on some responsibility for integrating subsystems. This doesn't mean it will be the lead systems integrator on the 747-8 cockpit--Boeing will retain that role.
Jim Ranghelli (see photo) has become executive director for business development for International Jet Management at Washington Dulles International Airport. He was an executive with Midcoast/Jet Aviation.
To submit Aerospace Calendar Listings, Call +1 (212) 904-2421 Fax +1 (212) 904-6068 e-mail: [email protected] Feb. 19-20--Asia Business Forum's Indian Airports Development Conference 2007. InterContinental The Grand, New Delhi. Call +65 (65) 368-676 or see www.abf-asia.co Feb. 20--Royal Aeronautical Society Capital Branch's Winter Lecture and Annual General Meeting. Speaker: FAA Administrator Marion C. Blakey. Boeing offices, Arlington, Va. Call +1 (703) 739-6700 ext. 108.
U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Adlai Hardin has prohibited Comair's pilots from striking over planned $15.8-million cuts in pay and benefits, ruling on a management motion. Carrier officials say they will impose new contract terms at 11:59 p.m. Feb. 9 if no other agreement is achieved. Comair says the average pay reduction will be 11%.
Airlines are concerned that an ambitious effort to redraw Europe's airspace map is being hindered by states' reluctance to carve up their borders in the sky. If the countries can't get their act together, European leaders must step in and assert more control over the process, airline groups say. Rearranging airspace regions is considered an integral part of the larger Single European Sky (SES) initiative. All parties agree that the efficiencies promised by SES can only be realized by simplifying the complicated web of European aviation boundaries.
It may be summer before Airbus learns whether its sole remaining A380 freighter customer, UPS, stays committed to the program, but company officials see an opportunity in Cathay Pacific to shore up the struggling variant. The Asian carrier is expected to issue a request for proposals in the coming months for a large cargo hauler. The competition would pit the A380 against the Boeing 747.
NASA astronaut Michael Lopez-Alegria holds the new U.S. record for time spent spacewalking--61 hr., 22 min.--following his completion of a third extravehicular activity (EVA) in nine days. His spacewalking partner, NASA's Sunita Williams, gained the women's record on the 6-hr., 40-min. EVA Feb. 8. She has now spent 29 hr., 17 min. in four EVAs, all of them since she arrived at the International Space Station on the space shuttle Discovery in December.
A News Break item incorrectly stated the closest distance that the New Horizons spacecraft will be from Jupiter (AW&ST Jan. 22, p. 22). New Horizons will pass within 2.3 million km. (1.4 million mi.) of the planet.
Amy Butler (Orlando, Fla.), David A. Fulghum (Washington)
The Air Force's $153.9-billion budget request for Fiscal 2008 is merely an attempt to slow losses from what one senior Air Force official calls the "insidious effect" of reduced readiness brought on by years of fiscal pressures. An associated and perhaps overly ambitious get-well plan calls for adding $20 billion annually to its budget for the next 20 years, beginning in Fiscal 2009. This would be to improve readiness and stabilize production rates of F-35s and F-22s, and procure needed cargo and refueling aircraft sooner.
Germany plans to have six Tornado reconnaissance aircraft operational in Afghanistan by mid-April to meet a request by the North Atlantic Treaty Organization for more intelligence collection capacity. The German cabinet last week gave the green light for the deployment after prolonged internal debate. Although strong opposition persists, parliamentary go-ahead is expected next month.
Safran's Turbomeca unit has laid the cornerstone of a plant that will house all of the development and production activities at its main site in Pau, in southwestern France, into a single new facility (AW&ST Dec. 5, 2005, p. 60). The new digs are expected to be ready in 2008.
EXECUTIVE JET MANAGEMENT (EJM) HAS OPENED an office for charter sales and service in the Preston Center in the Dallas Park Cities area to serve Texas and the southwestern U.S. Maurice Levy, EJM senior vice president for sales, says "four of the top 10 fastest-growing cities fall into that market." Since 2003 EJM has opened offices in Teterboro, N.J., San Jose, Calif., and Chicago, and intends to open another office in south Florida. EJM is a subsidiary of NetJets Inc.
Don't look for Boeing to make any big acquisitions anytime soon. "We really have an organic [growth] strategy and will fill in stuff around the sides," CEO James McNerney told investors at a Cowen & Co. conference last week in New York. Those fill-ins should include more international acquisitions, services operations and product and technology-based add-ons for the company's defense unit, he says. "We don't have any big, big acquisition plans in mind at all." McNerney says one of his top priorities is executing on Boeing's record backlog.
John Walker is playing a key role in devising better ways for unmanned aircraft to operate in civil airspace, and he sees the stage being set for rapid aviation innovation like that experienced in the early 20th century. In fact, the current unmanned aircraft system (UAS) era looks to him like another Kitty Hawk. "There are multiple industries in the U.S. [and abroad] that do not know today they will have a UAS in their business plan in 5-10 years," Walker says of the huge potential for civil applications.
