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Magazine Issue

Aviation Week & Space Technology December 15/22, 2014

VOL. 176 NO. 44 December 15, 2014

Photography Issue

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Top 16 Aviation/Aerospace Photos Of 2014

Dec 15, 2014
More than 130 photographers from 20 countries submitted more than 500 images for Aviation Week's 23rd Annual Photo Contest. See the best photos selected by our panel of judges.
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Editors' Picks 2014 Photo Contest Winners

Dec 15, 2014
We share some of our favorite images from the civil and defense segments of aerospace/aviation industry.
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Meet The Winners Of Aviation Week's 2014 Photo Contest

Dec 15, 2014
More than just winners of the top aviation photo contest, this group use their cameras to convey their deep experience and love for aviation.
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Who Judges Aviation Week's Photo Contest?

Dec 15, 2014
Our executive editor, a former Smithsonian Air & Space Museum staffer, director of photographer for LIFE books, Reuters photo editor and U.K.-based aviation photographer collaborate to select the best photos.

Feedback

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Letters From Our Readers (Dec. 15, 2014)

Dec 15, 2014
Norwegian Would . . .? In “Redefining the Model” (AW&ST Nov. 24, p. 38) Norwegian CEO Bjorn Kjos clearly states that NAI will be based in Ireland “because it needs a European Union air operator certificate to gain access to traffic rights to destinations in Asia.” The article also addresses the fact that Norway already has an open skies agreement with the U.S.

Who's Where

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New Positions, Promotions, Honors And Elections (Dec. 15, 2014)

Dec 15, 2014
Bridget Lauderdalehas been appointed senior vice president-corporate strategy and business development of the Lockheed Martin Corp., Bethesda, Maryland. She has been vice president/general manager of Aeronautics Operations and was vice president/general manager for the F-16, F-2 and T-50 programs. Patricia L.

Up Front

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Opinion: A&D Must Disrupt Its R&D Funding Routine

Dec 15, 2014
A&D players should approach their innovation agenda more like startups do in the Silicon Valley.

Leading Edge

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How Dzyne’s Experience Shaped Mooney’s New M10 Light Aircraft

Dec 16, 2014
Mooney International turned to Dzyne Technologies when it wanted to design its first all-new light aircraft in decades, the M10, and do it behind closed doors.

Reality Check

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Opinion: Chinese Stake In Toulouse Airport Not Cataclysmic

Dec 15, 2014
Local politicians rail about Chinese group’s takeover of Toulouse Airport, but the move may not matter much in the long-term.

Airline Intel

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Oneworld Might Be A Temptation For China Eastern Airlines

Dec 15, 2014
With many nearby partners, China Eastern Airways cannot be fully comfortable in Skyteam. Meanwhile, its relationship with Oneworld members is deepening.

In Orbit

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Deep-Space Navigation Experiment Going to ISS

Dec 15, 2014
NASA’s New Horizons Pluto probe is awake and getting ready to fly past the Solar System’s icy outlier and its moons next summer

Washington Outlook

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Averting Shutdown, Congress Adds Money For Lawmaker Priorities

Dec 15, 2014
A $1.1 trillion omnibus spending bill designed to keep the U.S. government open for the remainder of fiscal 2015 includes $18 billion for NASA for the year.

The World

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Etihad-Air Berlin Deal OK’d

Dec 15, 2014
Germany’s federal aviation authority LBA has decided that Air Berlin is still a company under effective control of Europeans and therefore cleared the airline’s current relationship with its main shareholder, Etihad Airways, with some conditions. Germany’s transport ministry stated the decision will be issued formally in the coming days. Conditions include a requirement for a majority of board members to be EU nationals. The Air Berlin chairman also has to be European, and the airline has to submit full transcripts of board meetings to LBA.
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Triumphant Spirit

Dec 15, 2014
Spirit AeroSystems will pay Triumph Group $160 million to take on the former’s Gulfstream wing work packages in Tulsa, Oklahoma. The companies announced a deal Dec. 9. “This transfer continues Spirit’s transformation and allows us to further focus on our core markets of aerostructures for commercial and defense aircraft,” Spirit CEO and President Larry Lawson says. Triumph says it becomes a “major” provider of wings to Gulfstream, supplying the G280, G450, G550 and G650.
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DLA Suppliers Listed

Dec 15, 2014
The U.S. Defense Logistics Agency has named its best-performing suppliers for 2014 as part of the Pentagon’s effort to name-and-shame industry into helping achieve better acquisition outcomes. Forty of the agency’s 153 parts and commodity suppliers with the largest contracts, together accounting for more than $5 billion in annual contract spending, have been listed in three tiers of favorites. They include primes like Boeing and Lockheed Martin in the top tier, as well as small businesses like I-Solutions Direct.
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Cygnus On An Atlas

Dec 15, 2014
Orbital Sciences Corp. says it will resume Cygnus cargo carrier flights to the International Space Station in September 2015 with the United Launch Alliance Atlas V 401 standing in while its Antares launcher is upgraded. A reengined Antares will resume flights to the ISS for NASA in early 2016, and Orbital says it expects to accomplish all remaining cargo deliveries under its $1.9 billion Commercial Resupply Services contract with NASA by the end of 2016 at no extra cost to the agency, using a long-planned upgrade to the Cygnus.
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Wakeup Call

Dec 15, 2014
Controllers at the Johns Hopkins University’s Applied Physics Laboratory are checking out NASA’s New Horizons probe after a successful pre-programmed reactivation Dec. 6, preparing for an unprecedented flyby of Pluto and its five known moons on July 14. The 70-meter Deep Space Network antenna at Canberra, Australia, received the signal indicating the 478-kg (1,050-lb.) nuclear-powered spacecraft had switched from hibernation to active mode for the 18th time since it was launched on Jan. 19, 2006. It will remain active until after it passes within about 6,000 mi.
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Bolden Visits China

Dec 15, 2014
NASA Administrator Charles Bolden took advantage of an international air traffic control conference in Beijing last month to meet with Wang Zhaoyao, director of the China Manned Space Engineering Office. Jaiwon Shin, associate NASA administrator for aeronautics, is chairman of the 23-nation International Forum for Aviation Research that met in Zhuhai, China, so the visit apparently fell within the exemption for multilateral conferences in the congressional ban on space cooperation with China.
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Italy, Turkey Win F-35 Work

Dec 15, 2014
The Pentagon has selected F-35 development partners Italy and Turkey to handle major maintenance, repair, overhaul and upgrade work for the single-engine, stealthy fighter in Europe, with facilities operational by 2018. The U.S. Defense Department plans to announce the location of maintenance for the Pacific region this week. Japan and Australia are expected to fare well in those assignments. Italy’s Cameri Air Base will be the site for heavy airframe maintenance. Turkey will initially handle the heavy engine maintenance for the Pratt & Whitney F135.
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Stitched Prseus Structure Delivered for NASA Tests

Dec 15, 2014
A 30-ft. long, multi-bay box test article made out of a low-weight, damage-tolerant, stitched composite structural concept called Pultruded Rod Stitched Efficient Unitized Structure, or Prseus, has been delivered to the NASA Langley Research Center for evaluation.
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A350, A380 Doubts Dominate Airbus Investor Forum

Dec 15, 2014
Renewed discussions around deliveries of the A350 and the future of the A380 along with a less than enthusiastic outlook for future profits left their mark on the Airbus share price last week. The stock was down more than 10% on Dec. 11, the worst decline in six years.
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IATA Predicts Brisk Air Travel Market

Dec 15, 2014
The global airline industry is forecast to benefit significantly from the drop in fuel prices, but part of the improvement will be passed on to consumers as lower fares, the International Air Transport Association (IATA) forecasts. The association believes airlines will post a combined profit of $25 billion in 2015, up from $19.9 billion this year, $10.6 billion in 2013 and $6.1 billion in 2012. “We see falling oil prices giving a great boost both to the industry and consumers,” IATA Chief Economist Brian Pearce said last week.

Correction

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Judge In Wrong Court

Dec 15, 2014
An item in the Nov. 24 Washington Outlook column (page 20), “Size Doesn’t Matter,” misstated the type of judge who ruled in a dispute over a UAV fine by the FAA. The story should have stated that an administrative law judge initially ruled on Raphael Pirker’s case. The NTSB overturned it.
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Errors In P-8 Story

Dec 15, 2014
Correction:. The Dec. 1/8 article “Uncivil 737s” (page 49) incorrectly stated some of the capabilities of the P-8A. The Navy says it has not seen a “current active plan” to test depth charge capability, and notes that the SLAM-ER is no longer part of the program of record. In addition, the rank of VP-30’s officer in charge of fleet integration for the P-8A and MQ-4C was misstated. He is Cmdr. Andrew Miller.

Space

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New Chinese Launchers Delayed, Moon Rocket Planned

Dec 15, 2014
Delays in current launcher development are not deterring Chinese space industry managers from planning a Moon rocket. They aim to put a rover on Mars around 2020, too.
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With Ariane 6, Europe Charts New Course To Keep Launch Industry Competitive

Dec 15, 2014
After years of debate, ESA approves plan for new family of Ariane 6 rockets to keep Europe competitive in launch market.
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Orion Flight Test Generated 200 GB Of Engineering Data

Dec 15, 2014
Data from the Orion flight test—recorded at much higher rates than the normal 1-Hz used operationally so engineers can pinpoint the changes in loads and other factors during the flight—will be used to validate models and improve designs.

Defense

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KF-X Kept On Back Burner As Boeing Pushes Super Hornet

Dec 15, 2014
The South Korean parliament, allowing only modest funding for preliminary KF-X work, has kept open the possibility of economizing by replacing an indigenous KF-X design with the Boeing F/A-18E/F Super Hornet or an advanced development of that type.
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Submarine Hunt Could Be Timely Reminder For Britain

Dec 15, 2014
Recent submarine sightings near U.K. bases raise pressure on defense ministry to deploy new maritime patrol aircraft.
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France Begins Replacing Tankers

Dec 15, 2014
France is slowly replacing its aging Boeing KC-135Rs with Airbus A330 multirole tanker-transports, though defense budget constraints are hindering the transition.
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Marines Propose Rapidly Mobile F-35 Operations

Dec 16, 2014
Old-school Stovl: U.S. Marines’ plan for operating under fire looks a lot like the Royal Air Force’s Cold War doctrine.

Unmanned Systems

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Collision Avoidance For Low-end UAVs

Dec 15, 2014
UAV developer forms separate company to produce collision-avoidance systems for unmanned aircraft and general aviation.

Air Transport

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FAA’s ADS-B 'Out' Mandates Challenged By Industry Groups

Dec 15, 2014
Many A&D entities voice concern about FAA ADS-B 2020 deadline; FAA in turn ponders some appeasements to meet that date.
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New Eurowings Will Operate Fleet Of Over 100 Aircraft

Dec 15, 2014
Lufthansa making substantial changes to its strategy and plans to attack low-cost and Gulf carriers head-on with a new division.
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Chinese Budget Carrier 9 Air Wants Second Base

Dec 15, 2014
The move will put competitive pressure on the Guangzhou city government, on which 9 Air relies for political support when seeking route rights. If permitted by the Civil Aviation Administration of China, the second base also would give 9 Air an alternative path for development should its Guangzhou-centered strategy falter.
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NTSB: Flaws In Process, Oversight Enabled 787 Battery Fire

Dec 15, 2014
The safety board’s final report on an APU battery fire in a JAL aircraft contains 18 recommendations to the FAA, Boeing and lithium-ion battery manufacturer GS Yuasa Corp., adding to five recommendations issued earlier in the investigation.

Future of the 757

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Airbus Discusses Long-range A321 With Key Customers

Dec 15, 2014
With 757 retirements looming, Airbus promotes new version of A320neo to fill the gap, citing range and cost advantages over Boeing models.
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Airlines Signal Demand For Long-range Narrowbody

Dec 15, 2014
As their 757s are being retired, airlines are seeking a replacement; so far, the proposed long-range Airbus A321neo is attracting the most interest.
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Boeing Revisits Past In Hunt For 737/757 Successors

Dec 12, 2014
Will Boeing repeat history by using the parallel 757-767 development model to answer the long-running 737/757 replacement question and, if so, why? The answers lie in the way the 757 and 767 satisfy vastly different markets yet share key design features.

Aerospace Calendar

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Conferences & Exhibitions

Dec 15, 2014
Jan. 13-14—MRO Latin America, Buenos Aires. Feb. 2-3—MRO Middle East, Dubai. March 5—Laureate Awards, Washington. April 14-16—MRO Americas, Miami.
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Upcoming Events (Dec. 15, 2014)

Dec 15, 2014
Feb. 1-3—Routes Americas. Denver. See www.routesonline.com/events/172/Feb. 1-3 Feb. 3-6—National Business Aviation Association’s Schedulers & Dispatchers Conference. San Jose, California. See www.nbaa.org/events/sdc/2015/ Feb. 11-14—Lawyer Pilots Bar Association’s Winter Convention. Sunscape Sabor Resort. Cozumel, Mexico. See www.LPBA.org

Viewpoint

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Opinion: Look Beyond Hype On Remote Towers

Dec 15, 2014
Remote tower allows air traffic services at a regional airfield to be provided by controllers located 900 mi. away.

Rotorcraft

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Europe’s Clean Sky Advances Helicopter Engine, Rotor Technologies

Jan 15, 2015
Green Rotorcraft program is testing fuel-saving diesel-cycle engine, advanced blades and electric tailrotor.