The Week In Aerospace And Defense

The second of three at-sea development test (DT) phases for the U.S. Navy’s Lockheed Martin F-35C began on Oct. 2 when two test aircraft, CF-03 and -05, landed on the aircraft carrier USS Eisenhower off the U.S. East Coast. The two-week DT-II phase follows DT-1 in 2014. See the F-35C in action

The U.K. will purchase an upgraded General Atomics MQ-9 Reaper to meet its Protector requirement for 20 medium altitude, long-endurance unmanned aircraft to replace its fleet of 10 Block 1 MQ-9s by the end of the decade. Adverse-weather operation and sense-and-avoid are likely requirements. Read more (subscribers)

BLR Aerospace is pitching an upgrade program to extend the life of Bell AH-1 Cobra attack helicopters still in service with several countries. Beyond its FastFin retrofit to improve anti-torque capability, the company is offering oil cooling, inlet barrier filter and structural upgrades. Read more (subscribers)

The future the C Series is in question after both Bombardier and Airbus both announced on Oct. 7 that they had ended talks on “business opportunities.” Reuters reported Airbus had been offered a majority stake in the program. Analysts warn the Canadian manufacturer could run out of cash to complete development and ramp up production of the airliner. Read more (subscribers)

Air France is to cut 2,900 jobs, close routes, reduce frequencies and scale back its long-haul fleet – mainly by accelerating retirement of Airbus A340s without replacing them with Boeing 787s as planned – in a bid by Air France-KLM to reduce its unit costs by an average of 1.5% a year from 2015-2017. Read more 

Finnair is betting on the Airbus A350 to reach the target of doubling its traffic and revenue on routes between Europe and Asia by 2020, from 2010 levels. The Helsinki-based carrier on Oct. 7 became the first European airline and third worldwide to take delivery of the A350-900. Read more 

Japanese regulators have approved plans for a new Air Asia low-cost-carrier joint venture, which plans to launch international and domestic services from Nagoya in spring 2016. Air Asia Japan is the second attempt to start a low-cost franchise in the country after a venture with ANA was dissolved in 2013. Read more (subscribers)

Pilots of a Trigana Air ATR 42-300 that crashed near the top of a ridge on approach to Papua, Indonesia’s Oksibil Airport on Aug. 16 were not following the airline’s visual guidance approach to the airport, according to a preliminary report by Indonesian investigators. All 54 passengers and crew were killed. Read more (subscribers)

Congressional restrictions on buying RD-180- rocket engines from Russia for its Atlas V launch vehicle could force United Launch Alliance for bid against new rival Space X for a U.S. Air Force GPS III launch in 2018 without an engine. This is the first of nine launches that will be competed. Read more (subscribers)

Antrix, commercial arm of the India Space Research Organization, has been ordered by an international tribunal to pay $672 million in penalties for its cancellation of a deal to lease satellite capacity to Devas Multimedia - a major embarrassment for the agency as it tries to gain a foothold in the global space market. Read more (subscribers)

Sierra Nevada will deliver its repaired Dream Chaser engineering test article to NASA Armstrong around year end, to resume atmospheric drop testing in first-quarter 2016. Three to six flights are planned, beginning with a repeat of the 2013 helicopter drop test and then the spacecraft will be towed behind an aircraft at a higher altitude. Read more