NEW DELHI — The Indian air force (IAF) has taken delivery of its second C-17 military transport aircraft, a month after the first arrived in India. Boeing is on schedule to deliver three more C-17s this year and five in 2014, giving India 10 aircraft and making it the largest C-17 operator outside the U.S. IAF chief Air Chief Marshal N.A.K. Browne took delivery of the second C-17 from Boeing in Long Beach, Calif., on June 22.
India’s Insat-3D weather satellite is getting ready for liftoff on July 25 from Europe’s spaceport near Kourou in French Guiana. “The satellite has been installed on [an] Ariane 5 launcher for Arianespace’s heavy-lift mission and the final payload integration is under way,” a scientist at the Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO) says. The Indian spacecraft is integrated in the lower payload position for Ariane 5’s dual-launch mission, along with Europe’s Alphasat telecommunications platform.
ATR estimates airlines will buy 1,340 turboprop airliners with 90 seats during the next 20 years, which sounds like a good market. But it could be a cramped one. If all five of the aircraft proposed for the segment go ahead, each will average a production run of fewer than 300.