Three of the world's four leading aircraft manufacturers have decided that selling in China requires bricks and mortar. Airbus assembles A320s in Tianjin, Embraer builds ERJ 145s in Harbin, and Bombardier sources fuselages in Shenyang for its Q400 turboprop and expects to do the same for the CSeries. All work through joint ventures that expose the Chinese to foreign technology and manufacturing expertise in return for access to the world's second-largest aviation market.
Hundreds of commercial transports will be disassembled and parted out this year to feed airline demand for lower-cost parts and components in the face of rising fuel prices. But unlike 10 or 15 years ago, when most of the airframes torn down had reached the end of their useful lives, increasingly younger aircraft now are seeing premature ends to their flying careers.
Boeing will begin sending the first 747-8 Freighter test aircraft to its Global Services & Support site in San Antonio next month as the company winds down flight testing in anticipation of certification and first delivery to launch customer Cargolux in July. Refurbishment of all five test aircraft is expected to take a year and will be performed by Boeing Defense Space & Security employees. In March, Boeing began shipping early production 787-8s to the same facility for modifications to meet certification production standards prior to delivery.
It remains to be seen how long China's economic growth will continue barreling forward at its current rate, and while no other Communist nation has managed the transition to the global marketplace with greater aplomb, at times Western reactions to this remarkable industrial transformation seem downright schizophrenic. One week China is a friend, the following week it is the next greatest threat. By turns, China siphons off jobs, or it is essential to Western companies' long-term growth. China exports deflation; it stokes soaring prices. China will boom; it will bust.
The Botswana Defense Force plans to modernize its training aircraft fleet with the Pilatus PC-7 Mk. II, replacing an earlier model PC-7 already in service. The deal for five aircraft and associated ground equipment is valued at around 40 million Swiss francs ($45.2 million), the aircraft maker reports. Deliveries under the contract are to start in early 2013, first with the ground-based training system and logistics support, and then followed later in the year by the aircraft. The deal is the first defense contract Pilatus has announced this year.
For decades, technical hurdles have overcome all attempts to develop fully reusable, single-stage-to-orbit (SSTO) launch vehicles, and with them the dream of aircraft-like operations. Now, a small U.K. company, bolstered by positive international space agency reviews, is poised to start ground tests of air-breathing engine technology that could make-or-break its 20-year ambitions to develop its Skylon SSTO spaceplane.
The display of dozens of unmanned-aircraft models at last November's Zhuhai air show made it clear that China, industrially and militarily, is moving rapidly to catch up—and perhaps ultimately overtake—the West in this burgeoning sector of aerospace.
The recent spate of air traffic controllers falling asleep at work has brought Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood in front of the cameras to expound on how no controller will be paid to nap. LaHood's response shows he's either mouthing a higher authority's directive or he refuses to accept scientific data. In 33 years of military and commercial flying, I can recall only one pilot who refused his crew the chance to nap. It was no mystery why flying with him was avoided whenever possible.
In “Boeing's Sunrise” (AW&ST March 28, p. 36), it is clear once again that there is a disconnect between FAA's dual roles of promoting U.S. aviation and regulating it. Surely an 11% increase in passenger seats in the Boeing 747-8 over the -400 requires a new evacuation test regardless of any additional exits. A new 90-sec. evacuation exercise should be standard procedure in all such cases. This is an example of the too cozy relationship between Boeing and FAA. Will Boeing soon hire another recent FAA retiree?
German researchers hope the upcoming flight test of an ambitious hypersonic demonstrator will pave the way for follow-on flights of a small sub-orbital reentry vehicle in 2020.
Sometime this year, a Japanese technician will perform the final piece of work on the last F-2 fighter to leave the Nagoya works of Mitsubishi Heavy Industries. With that, Japan's 45 years of post-war fighter production will cease and the progressive loss of skills already under way in systems manufacturing will have spread to every stage of building combat aircraft.
Brett Kelly has been appointed vice president of Airmall Maryland at Baltimore/Washington International Thurgood Marshall Airport by developer Airmall USA. Kelly was a vice president at General Growth Properties.
Tim Dooley has been promoted to senior vice president-finance and chief financial officer from vice president-financial planning and analysis at Indianapolis-based Republic Airways Holdings. He succeeds Hal Cooper, who retired March 31. Lars-Erik Arnell has been promoted to senior vice president from vice president-corporate development.
If there is a future for biofuels in aviation, it may be all the more secure thanks to work underway in the historic Chinese port of Qingdao. In this joint research effort, Boeing and a Chinese scientific institute are aiming at cutting the cost of bio jet fuel.
Ever since it was formed as a multi-national consortium four decades ago, Airbus has followed a straightforward model for building civil aircraft. Complete sections are fabricated in factories around Europe, then shipped to Toulouse or Hamburg, where they are joined together. So when the European airframer decided to set up its first final assembly line outside of Europe, it was a relatively easy step.
My experience is primarily in materials and manufacturing processes for space systems, not aircraft. Still, I have to question Boeing's apparent philosophy of designing the 737 with a limit on its operating life based on metal fatigue in the fuselage—expecting it to occur during the operational life of the aircraft while filled with passengers (AW&ST April 11, p. 36). Whether the design and inspection requirements were based on 30,000 or 60,000 pressurization cycles, it is the wrong way to go.
While attention focuses on Beijing's bold bid to take on Airbus and Boeing in the narrowbody airliner market, China is positioning its helicopter industry so it too can compete commercially, both domestically and internationally. The task falls to Avicopter, created by Avic in 2008 to consolidate China's state-owned helicopter industry.
Sometimes it helps to take a long view. Snecma decided two decades ago that China was a coming force in aircraft building, and ever since has steadily built up China's involvement in the best-selling CFM56 engine. That involvement has now reached the point of the complete low-pressure (LP) turbine module for the Boeing 737's CFM56-7B being made in Snecma's wholly owned plant at Suzhou in eastern China. Indeed, all LP turbine modules for U.S.-assembled CFM56-7Bs come from Suzhou.
The global air cargo industry may soon look significantly different now that Lufthansa Cargo is seeking to build an alliance to rival that of Skyteam Cargo's. But it may have to contend with some tough competition in its immediate vicinity now that Qatar Airways is eying an investment in Cargolux. “We will definitely make another try to start anew with Star Alliance partners,” Lufthansa Cargo's new CEO, Karl-Ulrich Garnadt, tells Aviation Week. “There is no reason why this should not work.”
David George has been named sales and service manager for military programs for the Vector Aerospace Corp., Huntsville, Ala. He was director of technology and business development for an aerospace manufacturing company.
Alitalia CEO Rocco Sabelli confirms he intends to resign before year-end on the assumption his mission to return the airline to profitability will have been met. Alitalia is on schedule to achieve operationally neutral results this year, notwithstanding the effects of fuel-price increases and turmoil in the Middle East, both of which are affecting results in medium-haul markets. The carrier has seen traffic slow in many of its Mediterranean and North African destinations.
The operational success the Royal Air Force has had with MBDA's dual-mode Brimstone is driving U.S. and French interest in the munition, says the RAF assistant chief of the air staff, Air Vice Marshal Baz North. The dual-mode weapon (with semi-active and millimeter microwave laser) has been among the main munitions the RAF Tornado GR4 has been relying on during Libya operations. Initial discussions with the French have begun, although they are at an early stage. Still unclear is which French and U.S. platforms would launch the weapons.
Delays in fielding new equipment are undermining the traditional superiority of the Indian air force's ratio of combat aircraft over neighboring rival Pakistan.
