NASA is undertaking an aggressive investigation of a spacesuit leak that allowed an estimated 1-1.5 liters of water to seep into the helmet and spacesuit of European Space Agency astronaut Luca Parmitano during a July 16 spacewalk outside the International Space Station. The planned 6-7-hr. excursion was cut short after roughly 90 min.
Swelling aircraft orderbooks are prompting questions about whether deliveries could inflate airline capacity too much in coming years. But Boeing maintains that a supply overload is unlikely to occur, and it has identified a set of metrics it says proves that market conditions justify the size of the current backlog.
Five years after General Electric launched its initiative to penetrate the small turboprop market with the acquisition of Czech engine maker Walter and the development of the H80, the company is midway through its first full year of production and poised to bolster its line-up with studies of additional variants.
Actually, the historical landing of an unmanned aircraft on a carrier deck is no big deal (AW&ST July 15, p. 25). U.S. Navy aircraft land routinely on carriers with no control input from the pilot on board. Automated landings have been around for quite a few years. And other military and commercial aircraft have had automated landing systems for decades in which the pilot on board merely monitors things “just in case.”
Carbon in its many forms is transforming manufacturing, from electronics to structures. Aerospace uses carbon in fiber form, but new nano-structured materials are emerging that promise improved properties and expanded applications.
Greg Raiff, CEO Private Jet Services (Seabrook, N.H. )
There is not a great deal of difference between the recent Asiana Airlines Flight 214 crash in San Francisco (AW&ST July 15, p. 22) and the 2009 Air France AF447 crash in the Atlantic other than the death toll. Both may have been caused by a lack of basic airmanship skills. In the case of the AF447 crash, when you pull the nose up and the airplane keeps going down, it is time to put the nose down and firewall it, no matter what the computer says.
Investigators looking into the July 12 Boeing 787 fire are now focusing on what caused an emergency locator transmitter (ELT) device to combust, and devising modifications to prevent any recurrence.
The U.S. will help Panama and the U.N. examine a load of missiles, MiG fighters and other weapons systems found aboard a ship in the Panama Canal sailing from Cuba to North Korea, U.S. State Department officials said last week. Deputy spokesperson Marie Harf would not specify whether the U.S. will take possession of the ship for the U.N. as a Council committee looks into possible sanction violations. A U.N.
Eight years ago, Southeast Asian-based airlines had just 29 turboprop airliners in the 70-seat class. Since then the fleet has more than tripled to 106, with ongoing orders making the region one of the most important for the turboprop sector. More remarkably, this growth has happened, and is continuing, amid powerful expansion by budget airlines, the classic enemy of the turboprop operator.
Jeffrey Wood has been appointed CEO of Sim-Industries, Sassenheim, Netherlands, a Lockheed Martin subsidiary. He succeeds founder Frank Uit den Bogaard. Wood was senior vice president of StandardAero's Airlines and Fleets business and had been president/CEO of Airfoil Technologies International. Uit den Bogaard will head simulator customer engagement and business development.
This week Aviation Week publishes two editions. On the far left cover, a Pratt & Whitney Canada photo shows a PT6A-140 turboprop, the latest version of the PT6A family, undergoing testing at the main assembly facility in Longueuil, near Montreal (page 40). Elsewhere in both editions are reports on defense spending in Asia (page 31), Eurocopter's EC225 (page 51), the Webb space telescope (page 26) and the Ethiopian Airlines 787 fire (page 22). Our MRO Edition includes additional articles.
USMC Maj. Gen. Glenn M. Walters has been nominated for promotion to lieutenant general and assignment as deputy commandant for programs and resources at USMC Headquarters. He has been commanding general of the 2nd Marine Aircraft Wing, Cherry Point, N.C. Honors And Elections
The breakdown in collegiality plaguing Congress is seeping into every corner of the Capitol. Overt partisanship surfaced last week in the House Science, Space and Technology Committee, where cross-party accommodation of constituent interest has been traditional when it comes to authorizing NASA and the civil space program.
Walking through the Paris air show last month, I was struck by the large number of companies exhibiting under one regional or cluster umbrella. There were, to mention a few, Aerospace Valley, Rockford Area Aerospace Network, Monterrey Aerocluster Mexico, Isle of Man Aerospace Cluster, Aero Montreal, Skywin Wallonie and Northwest Aerospace Alliance. Such groupings have a basic economic rationale: They allow small suppliers to be present at a show without bearing the full costs of renting their own stands in an exhibit hall.
Lockheed Martin's first GPS III satellite, a nonoperational pathfinder, is being readied for shipment to Cape Canaveral to run through a series of processing tests designed to validate plans prior to the first space vehicle processing. This pathfinder recently completed thermal-vacuum evaluations and was used to validate manufacturing procedures and testing protocols ahead of Lockheed building the first four satellites under its contract with the U.S. Air Force.
After receiving initial FAA certification in March of a system combining satellite-based communications with helicopter health and usage monitoring systems (HUMS), Honeywell aims to evolve the capability for inflight broadband connectivity on passenger airliners. (Photo: Inmarsat)
In the 1960s, NASA had a couple of ways to get to the surface of the Moon. They came together in this famous November 1969 photo of Apollo 12 Commander Pete Conrad examining the Surveyor 3 robotic lander, with the lunar module Intrepid that brought him to the Moon parked on the horizon. Those days are long gone now, but the U.S. space agency still wants to go to the Moon—for science and for exploration experiments.
Efforts to reshape and morph the avionics and air traffic management portfolios of Thales Aviation Solutions could put the U.S. arm of the French company in a better position to win work on upcoming FAA and Boeing platforms. The evolution is part of a broader company review launched by Thales Chairman and Chief Executive Jean-Bernard Levy after he stepped into the top position in December. Levy asked executives to come up with ways to increase growth and profitability, in part by creating value for customers.
I want to commend Los Angeles Bureau Chief Guy Norris on his coverage of the crash of an Asiana Airlines' Boeing 777 at San Francisco International Airport on July 6. After watching various talking heads on the “news” networks trying vainly to explain in a cogent manner anything about aircraft and aviation, it was a welcome relief to read Norris's clear, factual reporting on Aviation Week's various web portals.
Despite the challenges faced in scaling up feedstock and fuel production to commercial volumes—at competitive prices—aviation may yet achieve the target of meeting 1% of jet-fuel needs from sustainable biofuels by 2015, as airlines step up with plans for large-scale purchases.
Peter Aarons (see photo) has become Parsons Brinckerhoff's client relations manager for Los Angeles World Airports (LAWA). He was program manager on the Green Build Terminal Development Program for the San Diego County Regional Airport Authority. He has been a deputy program manager and technical consultant for LAWA's infrastructure master plan for another consulting firm and was a project construction manager for the San Francisco International Airport Commission.
$765,900, $7.14, £1995 ($3,076)—Prices, respectively, for a 2013 Beech Bonanza G36 equipped with air conditioning; June's per-gallon average for avgas in the Eastern U.S.; the peak-hour landing fee for a Citation Bravo at London City Airport. 382—The number of Bombardier business jets ordered or optioned by VistaJet and NetJets since December. Value: $14.2 billion.
Steve Kisor has been named president in the Americas for London-based Willis Aerospace. He was executive vice president based in Los Angeles. John Rooley has been named Vancouver-based CEO and will remain president/CEO of Willis Aerospace in Canada.
