Responding to reader Alex Cole ( AW&ST April 7/14, p. 10), I fail to dismiss the SAM threat as summarily as he does. The threat is very real in many parts of the globe. I agree with Israel’s approach of having limited countermeasures installed on commercial airliners. There are ways to diminish the SAM threat, such as maintaining a reliable inventory of the munitions, but until then, the threat they pose is all too real. Phil van Leeuwen Lawrenceville, N.J.
Boeing is testing the first P-8A maritime patrol aircraft to be produced for the U.S. Navy under the third Low Rate Production (LRIP-3) batch, marking the start of a new expansion phase that will see the operational fleet increase to 21 by year-end. AviationWeek.com/Ares
ROTORCRAFT EASA certified Airbus Helicopters’ new version of the EC145 light twin-engined helicopter on April 16. Airbus says 20 of the EC145 T2s are in series production at the company’s factory in Donauworth, Germany. Around 100 have been ordered, with most destined for air ambulance and law-enforcement use. Fifteen military-specification aircraft, known as EC645 T2s, have been ordered by the German army for use by the country’s Special Forces Command.
ROTORCRAFT Bristow Group has taken delivery of its first AgustaWestland AW189 super-medium helicopter. The first aircraft, G-OENB, was delivered to the company’s base at Norwich, England, on April 18, having been registered the day before. The helicopter is due to begin operations in the next few weeks. Bristow has six AW189s on order for delivery through 2016 for its oil and gas support work, with the first positioned at Norwich to support a contract with oil and gas company GDF SUEZ E&P.
An unidentified blended wing-body aircraft was photographed over Wichita on April 15, a little more than a month after an apparently similar aircraft was seen over Amarillo, Texas ( AW&ST March 31, p. 30). The trailing edge seems to be less jagged than that of a B-2, and the sweep angle greater. The U.S. Air Force’s 509th Bomb Wing, which earlier confirmed that the Amarillo aircraft was not one of its B-2s, has refused to further discuss individual operations. Air Force headquarters has not responded to request for comment on the Wichita photo.
One or more of the contenders for the U.S. Navy’s Unmanned Carrier-Launched Airborne Surveillance and Strike System (Uclass)—Lockheed Martin, Boeing, General Atomics Aeronautical Systems and Northrop Grumman—may decline to bid unless they can persuade the Navy to change its requirements, according to government and analyst sources close to the program.
May 5-8 —32nd Annual Space Power Workshop, Manhattan Beach (Calif.) Marriott. www.cvent.com/d/g4qjz1 May 5-9 —American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics’ SpaceOps 2014: 13th International Conference on Space Operations. Pasadena (Calif.) Convention Center. www.aiaa.org/spaceops2014
In the midst of an ongoing lobbying fight over the fate of the A-10 Thunderbolt II, the Air Force chief of staff is making a last-minute pitch to Congress to retain the service’s plan to retire the aircraft affectionately known as the Warthog. Gen. Mark Welsh, himself a former A-10 pilot, is casting his argument in economic terms: the Air Force stands to save $4.2 billion by retiring the A-10 fleet, he says.
