A top Chinese satellite navigation engineer says China will take its Beidou constellation worldwide in the next decade. According to Sun Jiadong, chief designer of the three-satellite Beidou Navigation System, plans call for adding another 35 satellites by 2012 to support a regional system for China and the Asia-Pacific region. By 2020, the system will be able to provide navigation signals—and communications—anywhere on Earth, Sun told the CCTV television network.
NASA is prohibited by Congress from spending Fiscal 2010 money on shutting down its Constellation Program of exploration to the Moon, Mars and beyond, but it’s moving ahead with long-range planning for the new approach reflected in the Fiscal 2011 budget request.
The Swedish defense establishment has awarded Saab a 450-million-kronor ($57.2-million), two-year contract to develop an enhanced avionics suite for the Gripen fighter. The funding is aimed at jump-starting work on an avionics package that would not enter service on Gripen for another decade. The package is intended to provide for new displays, as well as a new processing backbone to handle more data and process it more quickly. The effort should also make it easier for new sensors to be integrated onto Gripen, Saab says.
Boeing and Honeywell’s UOP fuel processing subsidiary is taking its aviation biofuels drive to China. PetroChina, part of the state-owned China National Petroleum Corp., has agreed to begin evaluating in June how a sustainable aviation biofuels industry might be established in China. It is part of a broader biofuel agreement between China’s National Energy Administration and the U.S. Trade and Development Agency.
Peter J. Tobin has become acting CEO of the CIT Group Inc. of New York. He will remain a director and succeeds Jeffrey M. Peek, who has resigned. Tobin is a former chief financial officer of the Chase Manhattan Corp. and the Chemical Banking Corp. Gerald Rosenfeld, Anthony P. Terracciano and Laura S. Unger have been appointed to the board of directors. Christopher H. Shays and Lois M. Van Deusen have resigned from the board. Rosenfeld is deputy chairman of Rothschild North America, and previously was its CEO.
While Air Combat Command focuses on the new bomber, some other capabilities, including a new unmanned aircraft and some weapons, are not likely to garner major funding in Fiscal 2012.
Boeing is starting conversion of the first of six retired F-16A and C models from U.S. Air Force inventory at Cecil Field in Jacksonville, Fla., as prototypes for the QF-16 drone program. The company leads a team that will focus on the aircraft’s flight control regime and includes BAE Systems. They are working under a $69.7-million Phase 1 development contract. USAF wants 126 QF-16s drones as replacements for QF-4s by 2014.
Ever since it was deregulated in 1978, the U.S. airline industry has made an art of setting money on fire. While some investors have profited from airline stocks’ wild fluctuations, many more have been burned or wiped out altogether when carriers restructured their businesses under bankruptcy protection. But a report by CRT Captial Group analysts Michael Derchin and Ben Shim is urging investors to take a fresh look at the industry as it heads into a recovery.
South African Airways is adding five Airbus A320s to its existing 15-unit commitment for the narrowbodies. The deal, announced May 27, will see deliveries start in 2013. SAA has opted for International Aero Engines V2500 powerplants. The airline had already signed for 22 A320s, but seven were sold to TAM of Brazil in 2003 when SAA opted for Boeing 737-800s.
House lawmakers from both parties are putting more pressure on Transportation and Infrastructure Chairman James Oberstar (D-Minn.) to water down legislation regarding aircraft repair stations in other countries. Oberstar’s proposal, part of the House FAA reauthorization bill, would require foreign repair stations to be regularly inspected by the FAA. That concept has been heavily criticized by the airline and MRO industries, which prefer Senate language that would essentially exempt the European Union and nations that also have safety agreements with the U.S.
USAF Air Combat Command chief Gen. William Fraser doesn’t agree with the Navy’s projections that the F-35 will cost more to maintain than previously expected. Officials at Naval Air Systems Command calculate a higher cost for operating the system for 65 years than the Joint Strike Fighter Joint Program Office. The recent Navy study finds sustainment for the single-engine stealthy fighter could cost about $442 billion (in Fiscal 2002 dollars) more than planned. “We don’t agree with the Navy numbers,” Fraser tells Aviation Week.
After breaking records in 2008, revenues in the global aerospace and defense industry were flat in 2009 and profits declined somewhat. But measured against the backdrop of the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression, the performance turned in by the A&D sector was encouraging. “Flat” seems to be the new “up,” and the industry is fortunate to have commercial aircraft backlogs equivalent to more than six years’ worth of production and long-term defense purchase agreements, both of which provide a cushion against the recession.
The European Aviation Safety Agency has authorized Part 147 approval from the U.K. Civil Aviation Authority for new instructor-led and advanced aircraft simulation training programs for the Boeing 787 and 747-8. The courses cover mechanical and avionics theory and replicate the classroom work but with students using tablet PCs to access airplane maintenance data using the same software as is used on the flight line or in the hangar.
Business aviation leaders in Europe are urging changes in several new operating rules that they fear, if left as is, will adversely affect the bizav sector. Since 2008, commercial air transport flights throughout the European Union have been governed by an interim set of regulations known as EU-Ops, which were drawn from Joint Airworthiness Authorities (JAA) specifications and national rules. Noncommercial activities have continued to be guided largely by national regulations.
Arianespace has been selected to launch Britain’s new Skynet 5D satellite, an Astrium-built unit set to be orbited in the first half of 2013. Together with a contract for Intelsat 17, also awarded last week (see p. 18), the Paris-based launch provider says it now has seven telecom satellite orders this year, including two unannounced. Arianespace was slated to return to service late last week, carrying Germany’s second ComsatBw military communications satellite and SES’s Astra 3B broadcasting spacecraft.
FedEx’s alleged failure to revise its Continuous Airworthiness Maintenance Program last week drew a $1.55-million proposed civil penalty from the FAA, which the carrier is appealing. The FAA alleges that FedEx failed to ensure that it was using “approved standards, inspections and time limitations” for 14 cargo unit load devices that were used on 124 flights from March 20-April 17, 2008.
Honeywell is closely analyzing a pair of TPE331 engines on an aircraft flown through ash clouds over the U.K. as part of efforts to scientifically quantify the true impact of volcanic ash on aircraft engines.
India is embracing medium- and long-range precision-strike weapons, short-range directed-energy air defenses and unmanned combat air vehicles as key aspirations for its future arsenal, according to a technology plan expected to be released imminently.
U.S. regional airlines, facing what seems to be a near-certain future of consolidation and a moment of truth this decade on contract renewals for aircraft of 50 seats or fewer, could find an escape route in the relaxation of scope clauses in pilot contracts of their major airline partners. But they had better not count on it.
