Astronaut Sandra Magnus, STS-135 mission loadmaster, floats in the Raffaello Multi-Purpose Logistics Module, delivered to the International Space Station (ISS) by the space shuttle Atlantis on the final mission of the shuttle era.
Despite looming reductions in defense spending, the German air force plans an extensive upgrade of its unmanned aircraft fleet throughout the decade. A key element to realizing that vision will be trials of the Euro Hawk signals-intelligence aircraft, which could arrive in Germany July 19. The UAV—a modified version of the Northrop Grumman Global Hawk—will serve to validate not just the feasibility of the sigint version, but also whether Germany should purchase four wide-area surveillance Global Hawks, says a senior German air force officer.
Shortfalls in European defense capacities, which have already been felt during the air war in Libya, could be exacerbated by spending cuts that are beginning to manifest themselves in that arena. The campaign in Libya has been suffering in part because of a shortage of intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance assets, warns a European military official involved in operational planning. He cites as an example a shortage of Predator unmanned aircraft, noting that there are only a few on hand.
The U.S. Air Force's F-22 fighter remains subject to the longest full-force grounding of any combat aircraft in recent history, with no cause firmly identified. Meanwhile, documents show that the focus of the investigation—the onboard oxygen-generation system (Obogs)—has been a flight safety issue for many years on the F/A-18C/D Hornet, increasing the number of cases where aircrew were affected by hypoxia, or lack of oxygen, in flight.
Aircraft and saltwater do not mix well, at least not from the aircraft's point of view. And as a result of that unfortunate fact, the tsunami that devastated northeast Japan in March will lead to a flurry of orders for aircraft. Japanese authorities have started to speak to aircraft manufacturers with a view to making purchases for replacement of some tsunami-damaged aircraft at Sendai Airport and the Matsushima Air Base, say industry executives.
In aerospace and defense, as in so many other sectors, South Korea is often seen as forever trying to mimic and catch up with Japan—whether by developing combat aircraft with U.S. help, building warships increasingly comparable to Japan's or, most recently, setting out plans for space launchers.
As India prepares to spend nearly $100 billion during the next decade on the modernization of its armed forces, Defense Minister A.K. Antony is warning suppliers and vendors of stringent action against corruption in defense deals.
India's insatiable appetite for new defense equipment is just that, underscored once more by the country's push to field a new-generation naval multirole helicopter to augment its existing fleet of 29 Westland Sea King Mk.42s and six Sikorsky UH-3H Sea Kings.
After two years of simmering tensions, Israel and Turkey are looking for ways to put their defense relationship back on a stronger footing. In the 1990s, the two countries were close allies with strong defense industrial ties. But a political shift in Turkey caused the relationship to fray; it reached a crisis point that began during the Gaza War between Israel and Hamas in late 2008 and surged after Israel intercepted a Turkish-led flotilla to Gaza in May 2010.
Temporary challenges” in a “few production areas in the supply chain” have prompted Boeing to initiate a month-long hold on deliveries from major suppliers to the 787's primary final assembly line. The move comes as the company takes the first steps to use a second line so it can ramp up production rates from the current two per month to 10 by the end of 2013.
The change of government in Thailand will have implications for the country's airline industry. The Puea Thai Party's landslide victory over the royalist-backed Democrat Party is good news for Thai AirAsia and bad news for Thai Airways International and its partner Tiger Airways. It could also spell trouble for Nok Air, a carrier that has links to the Thai monarchy.
There are optimistic and pessimistic views of the future of aviation. In the pessimistic view, the industry continues to be dominated by increasingly risk-averse corporations focused on incremental improvements that fail to keep pace with fast-rising fuel prices, climate change and disruptive advances in other industries. In this future, aviation fails to sustain the socio-economic benefit that has fueled its growth for more than 70 years.
Bran Ferren of Applied Minds believes aerospace, particularly the “space” element, needs new inspiration and that NASA, as the world knows it, should be re-born as a pure exploration organization to ensure relevancy for the rest of the 21st century and beyond. “The thing that's missing is called passion,” says Ferren, who is the co-founder, co-chairman and chief creative officer of the California-based special-effects technology, creative design and consulting company with clients ranging from the Walt Disney Co. to Northrop Grumman.
Persuading operators to forsake time-tested tube-and-wing narrowbodies and widebodies for new configurations will be hard. But if the upward trend in fuel price continues, or accelerates as global demand for energy escalates, the promise of dramatic fuel savings may force a shift.
The true test of whether composites can replace metals as the dominant raw materials from which aircraft are manufactured has still to come. Whether it is an all-new aircraft from Boeing before 2020 or Airbus after 2025, the next-generation single-aisle airliner will determine the balance of materials.
When KLM Flight 1233 took off from Amsterdam's Schipol Airport on June 29, on an otherwise unremarkable scheduled service to Charles de Gaulle Airport in Paris, it marked a milestone in the airline industry's drive to control fuel costs and meet emissions targets by using bio-derived fuels.
Eight years after the Concorde was retired, civil aviation remains firmly limited to subsonic speeds. Market studies continue to show an untapped demand for high-speed flight, but the financial commitment to tackle the technical challenges of developing an economically and environmentally viable supersonic transport has yet to materialize.
Pioneering aerospace engineer and Scaled Composites founder Burt Rutan makes no secret of his frustrations with today's air transport system or his gloomy prognosis for the future unless radical changes are made. Rutan's forthright views are built on a career of breakthrough innovations, fierce independence and a string of eye-catching designs that culminated with the world's first privately developed sub-orbital spacecraft.
Draconian deficit-reduction measures and yawning differences between service providers and users over who will pay make it hard to see how airspace modernization efforts in the U.S. and Europe can pick up the pace needed if system capacity is to meet the air traffic growth projected.
Low expectations and lack of leadership from major customers are preventing rotorcraft from making a move to the next generation. This is particularly clear in the case of speed, which in the military arena translates into survivability and in the commercial world into productivity—but at a cost that operators might not prove willing to pay.
Aviation is not immune to the hopes and hype surrounding emissions-free electric vehicles, and European aerospace giant EADS has fueled the debate by unveiling a concept for an all-electric airliner it believes could emerge within 25 years.
One issue could shape the future of general aviation—the likelihood that leaded aviation gasoline will be outlawed before the end of the decade. Years of work have failed to find a drop-in replacement for 100-octane low-lead (100LL) avgas, forcing the GA community to take the unprecedented route of recertifying the entire fleet to use a new fuel. Until recently the task looked almost impossible, but technical progress and attention from regulators now promise a breakthrough.
The pursuit of faster flight speed and affordable access to space are constant companions in aerospace's quest for continued relevance, and are set to remain so for the foreseeable future.
Once the smoke clears from the three-year debate over U.S. space policy ushered in by the return of a Democratic administration to the White House, NASA's human-spaceflight activities will look a lot like those planned and started under the preceding Republican administration.
