Asia-Pacific Staff (New Delhi), Graham Warwick (Sao Jose dos Campos, Brazil)
India’s venture to develop and build a 90-seat regional jet is set to gather pace, with the technical and industrial outlines beginning to take shape. The formal high-level committee report supporting the program’s launch is nearing completion and submission to the government. The document is intended to underpin a development effort that would catapult India into the ranks of Brazil, Canada, China, Japan and Russia in offering a jet to the regional airline sector. Engineering work could begin as early as next year.
The Interstate Aviation Committee has granted the type certificate to the Antonov An-158, a stretched version of the An-148 regional jet. The new version, certified Feb. 25, features a fuselage that is 1.7 meters (5.6 ft.) longer, improved avionics and winglets. The An-158 can carry 99 passengers in a single class with a range of up to 2,500 km (1,560 mi.) compared with 2,700 km for a 75-seat An-148-100B. Antonov expects first delivery this year.
Juliana Kfouri (see photo) has been appointed senior vice president of corporate strategy and special projects for Abu Dhabi-based Etihad Airways . She came from TAM Linhas Aereas, where she was chief information officer and director of information technology.
Turmoil in the Middle East has the the International Air Transport Association (IATA) annual general meeting (AGM) on the move. The IATA was scheduled to hold its 2011 AGM in Cairo, the city that hosted the then-fledgling organization’s second one in 1946. But the protests and political unrest that toppled long-time Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak on Feb. 11, perhaps coupled with ongoing turmoil in other countries in the region, forced IATA’s hand. The AGM, scheduled for June 5-7, is being moved to Singapore.
The U.K. aerospace industry potentially faces several more years of uncertainty, with government officials warning it will take longer than some had expected to rectify the imbalance between procurement plans and budget reality.
Airlines seemed well positioned just a few months ago to absorb higher fuel costs, which were forecast to rise through 2011 along with rising crude oil prices. Of course, that was barring any shocks to the system. Now all bets are off, with oil supplies in Libya and some other oil-producing countries at varying degrees of risk and crude oil prices at their highest level in two years.
Is anyone surprised that Boeing was the ultimate winner in the tanker competition? (AW&ST Feb. 28, p. 30). The U.S. has never awarded a major military contract to a foreign entity. Northrop Grumman knew the deck was stacked against the A330 after the contract was canceled. EADS should have known it and saved its time and money. Some might even say EADS did know it, but was willing to play along to provide the Pentagon with an air of competitive legitimacy.
Jeffrey Johnson has been named president of Boeing Middle East . He succeeds Paul Kinscherff, who becomes chief financial officer for international finance. Johnson, who will be based in Dubai, was a senior director of business development for Boeing Defense, Space & Security.
Intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance may offer low-hanging fruit in efforts to prune defense spending, congressional auditors suggest. ISR is critical in Iraq and Afghanistan. The trouble, the Government Accountability Office (GAO) says, is that the ad hoc processes the Defense Department created over the last decade to respond to changing combat needs have led both to duplication and gaps.
Russia launched a new navigation satellite, the Glonass-K, on a Soyuz-2.1b launcher on Feb. 26. It was the first Glonass launch from the Plesetsk Cosmodrome in northern Russia. Glonass-K is a new-generation satellite for Russia’s global navigation space system. It was developed by Reshetnev Co. using an unpressurized, three-axis-stabilized Express-1000K platform. The spacecraft weighs 935 kg (2,060 lb.) versus 1,450 kg for the Glonass-M series currently in orbit.
Christopher Brown is the new vice president of legislative and regulatory policy at the Washington-based Air Transportation Association of America . He comes from Manatt, Phelps & Phillips, where he was senior counsel of the Government and Regulatory Affairs Practice Group and senior congressional affairs adviser to United Airlines.
General aviation as an industry and as a community was overwhelmingly U.S.-centric since coming into its own after World War II. The airplanes were designed, built and used in the U.S. and the CEO’s name often appeared on the roof: Piper, Beech, Lear, Bell, Grumman and Cessna (well, Clyde’s nephew anyway), among them.
Altug Bekdemir has been appointed general manager of Munich-based Aviareps ’ new aviation and tourism management services in Turkey. He was a country manager for Austrian Airlines.
Bell Helicopter has introduced two new variants of its light single-turbine Model 407—the armed 407AH for export parapublic customers and commercial 407GX with Garmin G1000 glass cockpit. Both helicopters are making their debut this week at the Heli-Expo show in Orlando, Fla.
U.S. spaceflight managers are mapping a course for the International Space Station’s coming decade that they hope will “seed” a high-value commercial research economy in low Earth orbit, but first they must navigate some treacherous passages on Capitol Hill. NASA has scheduled the STS-135 mission on the shuttle Atlantis for June 28, and Congress has authorized the flight. Funding it is another question, and with fiscal conservatives pushing for deep spending cuts for the remainder of fiscal 2011, that question remains open.
A slight wrinkle appeared in SES’s guidance for 2011. And although the operator insisted the impact will be temporary—and, like rival Eutelsat, forecast strong growth in the years ahead—the dip may carry a premonitory warning.
The second prototype of Russia’s fifth generation Sukhoi T-50 fighter developed under the PAK FA program completed its maiden flight on March 4. The 44-min. flight took place at Knaapo’s airfield in Russia’s Far East.
The introduction of a wide-area multilateration (WAM) network in the North Sea is a prime example of how new surveillance technologies are driving the latest transformation in air traffic management. In 1990, U.K. controllers considered it a major breakthrough when offshore rebroadcasting stations allowed them to talk to helicopters servicing North Sea oil rigs. Now, thanks to WAM, controllers can also see these aircraft on their displays far beyond land-based radar range—something that would have seemed inconceivable to their counterparts 20 years ago.
The secretive National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (NGA) is looking for companies or other sources to help determine the most efficient way to digitize and release vast stores of high-resolution photographic imagery. And in a twist, NGA says the service provider might be able to “retain rights to distribute declassified imagery and recoup investment, for a specified period of time,” to be negotiated.
With India’s Helina air-launched anti-armor missile nearing its test-firing phase, developers are crafting plans to design a longer-range version of the air-to-ground guided weapon.
Monte Belger (see photo) has become vice president of industry relations for Metron Aviation , Dulles, Va. An industry veteran of 35 years, Belger was vice president of transportation system solutions for Lockheed Martin, following a career with the FAA.
Michael Cox has been named vice president of human resources at Duncan Aviation , Lincoln, Neb., after spending 28 years in the insurance industry. Justin Merkling is the new engine shop manager for Duncan Aviation, Battle Creek , Mich. He was one of the company’s Cessna Citation technical representatives.
The recent awarding of the U.S. Air Force tanker contract to Boeing is a major milestone for the Pentagon. A decade after the KC-X procurement process began, then wended its way through contracting irregularities and management missteps, the U.S. Defense Department may be poised to actually serve the interests of the warfighter.
China will launch the unmanned target for its first space docking in the second half of this year, having slipped a schedule that previously called for the module to be sent to orbit no later than 2010. The target is the Tiangong 1, described in the latest report as a “space module” but previously called an orbital laboratory. The Shenzhou 8 spacecraft, designed to carry a crew but unmanned for this technology-proving mission, will follow Tiangong into orbit two months later to execute the automatic docking procedure.
Led by Europe, demand for civil helicopters is showing signs of recovery, and 2011-15 deliveries will be 5% higher than during the last five years, at 4,200-4,400 aircraft, projects Honeywell.
