European network carriers are seeing a faster-than-anticipated rebound in revenue that is creating an improved earnings picture despite continued operational headwind.
“Pacific Watch” (AW&ST Oct. 11, p. 31) reports that Japan is debating whether to buy four RQ-4B Global Hawk surveillance aircraft. Articles like this make me question using remote-controlled aircraft at all. The principal argument almost always seems to be that drone use removes pilots from danger, coupled with a suite of very capable information-gathering capabilities. Every time a human climbs into the cockpit of a flying machine there is risk involved, but so what?
Ethiopian Airlines has ambitious plans to grow sixfold in the next 15 years and create new subsidiaries in other parts of Africa, together with Star Alliance members South African Airways and Egyptair.
A weak dollar and prospects of a strong workforce are prompting Extra Aircraft of Germany to set up an assembly facility for its Extra 500 turboprop in Montrose, Colo. The company received approval from the Montrose County Commission last month to use a county-owned hangar at Montrose Regional Airport for completing the small executive aircraft. Ken Keith, an American executive who acquired the company in 2003, says he expects assembly operations to begin before year-end and that the first U.S.-completed aircraft will be delivered next March or April.
Mark Bianchi has been named vice president and general manager of StandardAero ’s Los Angeles International Airport facility. He was executive vice president-aircraft maintenance for NetJets Aviation.
Asian airlines’ balance sheets will benefit from a round of raising capital that is being undertaken while the passenger market is strong. The rebound in air traffic and the need to finance aircraft on order are leading carriers to tap financial institutions and markets. Airline managers have also learned that it is important to have more cash on the balance sheet to cope with one-off events such as terrorist attacks that may lead to a sudden drop in traffic.
As the International Space Station passed the record set by Russia’s Mir as the longest continuously occupied spacecraft,the ISS crew activated a new system that will generate as much as 530 gal. of water a year for the station’s environmental control and life support system (ECLSS). On Oct. 22, station crewmembers ran their new Sabatier system for 8 hr., producing water from by-products of the ECLSS Oxygen Generation System and Carbon Dioxide Removal Assembly.
Nov. 8-10—SMI Group Conferences’ 12th Annual Global MilSatCom Conference and Exhibition. Millennium Conference Center, London. Call +44 (207) 827-6000, fax +44 (207) 827-6001 or see wwwsmi-online.co.uk/events Nov. 8-10—SAFE Association’s 48th Annual Symposium. Town and Country Resort & Convention Center, San Diego. Call +1 (541) 895-3014, fax +1 (541) 895-3014 or see www.safeassociation.com
The fluidic flight controls of the Demon UAV (AW&ST Oct. 11, p. 20) are an elegant solution for stealth that could easily find its way into other areas of aeronautics. Applied to the trailing edges of conventional control surfaces, fluidics could reduce the size of these assemblies while improving their response. The rugged simplicity of the systems could be used in challenging applications like the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency’s Mission Adaptive Rotor (AW&ST June 7, p. 24), where high cycle rates and light weight are needed.
Sam Scimemi (Washington, D.C.), Deputy, International Space Station (Washington, D.C.), NASA Headquarters (Washington, D.C.)
I would like to underscore some items related to your article “Power Options” (AW&ST Oct. 4, p. 48) and to relay NASA’s stance. Although NASA has studied nuclear thermal propulsion (NTP), the agency does not favor any one particular technology. Many factors go into implementing a Mars mission, including political support over several decades, funding, international partnering, nuclear waste and disposal, and mission challenges. Some key points:
The irrepressible traffic growth of European low-cost carriers is again making lots of noise. This time, it is due to Ryanair’s sudden decision to close its Marseille “base” and move pilots, flight attendants and aircraft to more tolerant locations in Italy and Spain. Europe’s best-performing low-fare airline decided to retreat after a French court ruled that Ryanair’s France-based flight crews must pay taxes and social insurance contributions locally rather than in Ireland.
Gary Payton, the recently retired Air Force deputy undersecretary of space programs, is trying to help set the record straight about NASA and human spaceflight plans, but it is a tough sales job, even for him. Payton, who flew on the space shuttle as a military payload specialist, reminds anyone who asks whether NASA is getting out of human spaceflight that the International Space Station is still carrying NASA astronauts, and he describes plans to replace the shuttle eventually after it is retired next year. But he is not happy about it.
NASA’s space shuttle Discovery is bound for its fleet-leading 39th and final mission, an 11-day voyage to the International Space Station to deliver an equipment storage compartment. The last scheduled run is taking place amid growing urgency for the White House, Congress and NASA to resolve uncertainties over how and when the 30-year-old program will end. Discovery’s liftoff from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center is scheduled for Nov. 1 at 4:40 p.m.
The coalition’s fight in southern Afghanistan is shifting demand for unmanned aircraft from the RQ-7 Shadow tactical UAV to the smaller Raven and Puma All Environment systems, according to Col. Gregory Gonzalez, the U.S. Army’s unmanned program manager.
ATK’s five-segment Solid Rocket Motor (SRM) is ready for flight testing, declares Charlie Precourt, vice president and general manager of ATK Space Launch Systems. ATK announced Oct. 27 that data from the second successful Development Motor test Aug. 31 showed that it performed “precisely as designed.”
Acquisition reforms sought by Pentagon leadership are hitting defense contractors on their margins, but industry might be heartened by a better-than-expected Fiscal 2012 defense budget request, according to analysts at RBC Capital Markets. After attending the Association of the U.S. Army fall conference in Washington, the analysts said there may not be much in the way of immediate “savings” from Defense Secretary Robert Gates’s five-year, $101-billion campaign.
Italy’s Avio is urging that Europe develop a derivative of the Vega light launch vehicle that could provide a cheaper alternative for exploration missions beyond low Earth orbit. The rocket, which would feature a new upper stage equipped with Hall-effect electric thrusters, instead of the present liquid propulsion design, could carry 600-700-kg. (1,320-1,540-lb.) payloads to Mars, Venus, near-Earth asteroids or comets in 1,000 days, or loft a 1,400-ton payload to the Moon in 300 days.
Two experts on U.S. export licensing are cautioning industry and observers to check their expectations about near-term improvements. For starters, bureaucratic support for Obama administration reforms—particularly in top State Department offices—could be too tepid to allow for quick reforms. And they further warn that the world’s multilateral business climate is changing faster than the recently ratified bilateral treaties with the U.K. and Australia can adequately address.
Peter A. Stanham (see photo) has been promoted to managing director of finance at American Airlines for Mexico, the Caribbean and Latin America. He will be responsible for financial management, business planning, procurement and accounting in 34 countries. He was senior manager of business planning.
If the European Union is to embark on ambitious new space undertakings commensurate with its economic weight, it may have to rely on new sources of funding, including off-budget financing. And it will have to find a way to fill short-term budget gaps to keep fledgling satellite navigation and operational Earth-observation programs on course. That was the consensus at a two-day conference at the European Parliament here last week.
As development wraps up on a range of naval missile systems, designers are turning their attention to new applications and upgrades. But scarce funding is hampering several near-term ambitions. The conundrum affects several manufacturers. MBDA’s Exocet Block 3 anti-ship missile is now operational with the French and Italian navies, while Kongsberg is readying the first shipments of the stealthy Naval Strike Missile (NSM) and the Saab/Diehl BGT Defense team isset to hand over the first RBS-15 Mk. 3 anti-ship and land-attack missiles.
European Union emissions allowance (EUA) prices made another assault on the €16.00 per metric ton mark in mid-October, but drifted lower later in the month as U.K. natural gas prices eased. EUAs for delivery in December 2010 closed at €15.36 ($21.32) per metric ton on Oct. 1, little changed from €15.38 on Sept. 1. Prices then began to gain ground, rising to an intra-month high of €15.86 on Oct. 11. But prices never managed to touch the €16.00 mark, and profit-taking saw prices fall throughout the rest of the month to trade at €15.01 by Oct. 26.
When the U.S. became the world’s largest economy in the late 19th century, it was not Great Britain that it eclipsed. It was China. By the middle of the 20th century, China dropped to 5% of global GDP. But it is now No. 2 and on a trajectory to be the world’s leading economy again—and one-third of the global economy—by the middle of this century. For aerospace OEMs, China is expected to be slightly more than 10% of the global market over the next 20 years.
Could an office worker in India have the best navigation algorithm for an unmanned aircraft, or a chemical engineer in China the solution to an aerodynamic problem on a commercial transport? Could Facebook be the key to creating future engineers?
