Herbert D. Kelleher, retired chairman/president/CEO of Southwest Airlines, has been named to receive the second annual Joseph T. Nall Award from the Washington-based National Transportation Safety Board Bar Association . The award recognizes individuals who have made contributions to aviation and transportation safety. Nall was a member of the NTSB from 1986 until his death in 1989 while on NTSB business in Caracas, Venezuela.
Russia’s NIS-Glonass is forming a joint venture with Antrix Corp., the marketing arm of the Indian Space Research Organization, to help it break into the market for satellite tracking and navigation services in India.
A U.S. State Department order for two upgraded Sikorsky S-61 utility helicopters for use in Afghanistan for drug interdiction brings the total purchased to 17 aircraft. Earlier this year, the department signed an indefinite-delivery, indefinite-quantity contract with Sikorsky for up to 110 upgraded S-61s or passenger and cargo transport operations worldwide. The first four aircraft are scheduled for deployment in Afghanistan this fall.
Adla Worobec (see photo) has been promoted to chief commercial officer at AeroMobile . She came to AeroMobile from Thus plc, the company’s Scotland-based cable and wireless subsidiary. She also worked for Connexion By Boeing as director-wireless channels.
Bob Tavares (see photo) has become vice president-microwave solutions for the Electronics Group of Crane Aerospace & Electronics , Redmond, Wash. He was vice president/general manager of Tyco Electronics’ M/A Com Div. David Perret has been appointed general manager of Crane’s Lyon, France, site. He was operations and customer support manager. Honors And elections
Delta Air Lines reached an agreement with Boeing to defer the delivery of 18 Boeing 787-8 aircraft for about a decade, to 2020-22, but some analysts wonder if Delta really is willing to wait that long for widebody replacements. Delta CEO Richard Anderson says he is satisfied with the existing fleet, especially given the airline’s investment in cabin upgrades such as lie-flat business-class seats, but consultant Craig Jenks, president of Airline/Aircraft Projects, says he is expecting some combination of orders from Delta for used and new equipment well before 2020.
Leading U.S. aerospace companies are establishing a fund that could provide a private-sector solution to the aircraft equipage dilemma threatening air traffic control modernization efforts.
A new lobbying coalition including Expedia, Sabre Holdings, Kayak and Farelogix argues that Google’s proposed $700-million acquisition of ITA Software would give the search engine giant control over the software that powers most of its closest rivals in travel search and allow Google to manipulate the online air travel marketplace. “The end result could be higher travel prices, fewer travel choices for consumers and businesses and less innovation in online travel search,” says the coalition, FairSearch.org. Google, of course, argues otherwise.
Nick Price has been appointed regional director-contract services for A.J. Walter Aviation . His new position follows a 15-year career at FLS Aerospace and SR Technics.
Kevin Pizzarello (see photo) has been named fluid control sales director at Circor Aerospace . Pizzarello made the transition from Parker Aerospace’s Fluid Systems Div., where he was business development manager-pneumatic, lube oil and fuel specialty products. He expanded the organization’s offerings and led program wins for the Pratt & Whitney geared turbofan engine and Rolls-Royce Advent engine programs.
China is studying a rocket engine with thrusts of 300-500 tons (660,000-1.1 million lb.), up to four times as powerful as its current equipment, while also working on reusable space launchers, senior leaders have told a U.S. industry delegation. The pace of Chinese launches is accelerating, says Yang Baohua, president of spacecraft-builder Cast. China has launched 11 satellites this year, has two at their launch sites preparing to go and will follow them with one more, making it 14 for the year. Next year it will launch 20, he says.
Engineers are moving into the last phase of detailed design for ExoMars, a twin lander/orbiter mission planned by the European Space Agency and NASA to pave the way for a sample return from the red planet. ExoMars was conceived as an all-ESA endeavor with a single launch. However, rising costs and technology risks forced planners last year to morph the undertaking into a twin-launch scenario, with NASA as partner, and to redefine system requirements. This was completed in March. Thales Alenia Space (TAS) was retained as prime contractor.
Carbon nanotubes, which are immensely strong and highly conductive, show the potential to transform composites and are among technologies the aerospace and defense industry is counting on to bring greater affordability, as well as performance, to its products. Other technologies described in this week’s package of articles, which begins on page 70, include additive manufacturing direct from digital models, wider use of modeling and simulation enabled by cloud computing, and crowd sourcing of ideas for more innovative products. Cover image from Istock.
Powered exoskeletons that enable ground crews to load and unload transports, or arm combat aircraft with missiles and bombs, unaided by bulky ground equipment, could be one of the first of a new breed of systems that augment human performance.
George Wilson has been named vice president-corporate safety and security for World Airways . Wilson is a retired U.S. Air Force brigadier general and a retired Delta Air Lines captain. He served as vice president-flight operations for World Airways and continued as director-operations until June 2008.
Lesley A. Kalan (see photo) has been appointed vice president-legislative affairs for Northrop Grumman Corp. Kalan was vice president with the Cohen Group from 2006 to 2010 and worked for five years as a senior analyst for the Defense Department. Kalan also served as a Committee Fellow and as a Presidential Management Fellow in the Office of the Secretary of Defense.
Systems engineering is critical to program success in aerospace and defense, but problems will continue until significant improvements are made, says an industry survey conducted for Aviation Week by IBM. Results were presented at the Aviation Week Aerospace & Defense Programs Conference Nov. 1-3 in Phoenix. The conclusion: “Program problems will continue without proactive action,” says John Farrant, manager of IBM’s aerospace and defense product life-cycle management solutions.
Unmanned aircraft that stay aloft for a year or more, never returning for refueling or repair, could take aviation into a new arena of omnipresent operations.
I worked in the aerospace industry from 1956 to 2002. During that time my roles centered on logical thinking in order to innovate in a world that needed a lot of innovation, so I am discouraged that Aviation Week appears to have embraced the dubious “anthropologic global warming” premise. The “green” frenzy will ultimately cost airlines and the public billions of dollars. It seems ludicrous to believe that global weather results are predictable decades in advance when it is obvious that weather results are currently unpredictable week to week.
A newly space-qualified Swedish technology could lead to “preloaded satellites” ready for rapid launch or orbiting in a “sleep mode” for quick awakening. A unit of Swedish Space Corp. (SSC) has space-qualified a high-performance “green” propellant on the main Prisma satellite, demonstrating the technology’s promise for cost and time savings in preparing satellites for launch, and in keeping them ready once they are fueled.
Space leaders in Europe fear the competitiveness of European companies is threatened by new U.S. public funding mechanisms for space services and calls for opening up European Union space programs to international suppliers.
Getting ahead in a changing game requires the aerospace and defense industry to tackle its biggest challenge—the affordability of its products and services. “The U.S. has consistently used superior technology to combat challenges. Now we have to bring technology to bear to meet the affordability challenge,” says Ray Johnson, Lockheed Martin senior vice president and chief technology officer.
The characterization of the business jet market structure in the “The Haves and Have Nots” (AW&ST Oct. 18, p. 52), is generally accurate. Large cabin, intercontinental aircraft are outperforming in sales versus other business jet categories.
Sophisticated modeling and simulation are becoming key to developing products, but the small companies that comprise much of industry cannot easily access or afford the requisite high-performance computing. To tackle the problem for U.S. companies, the National Center for Manufacturing Sciences (NCMS) plans to develop a network of high-performance computing centers to give small and medium-sized enterprises (SME) access to powerful modeling and simulation tools for product development.
Opening a little-used window in the atmosphere is enabling new sensor capabilities that are finding application in surveillance, target identification, weapon guidance, aircraft navigation and a range of other uses. Short-wave infrared (SWIR) sensors exploit the third and last atmospheric window through which photons can travel without being largely absorbed. But unlike medium- and long-wave infrared imagers, SWIR sensors see reflected, not thermal energy.
