GE Aviation is renaming its Czech turboprop subsidiary “to better represent the organization’s strategy, which is to develop, manufacture and support turboprop engines,” says Brad Mottier, head of its business and general aviation operation. The unit will now be called GE Aviation’s Business & General Aviation Turboprops. It is the former Walter Engines, which GE has been expanding since purchasing it two years ago. Besides new facilities, GE has introduced the H80 as an 800-shp. derivative of Walter’s M601 turboprop.
Recognizing that technology to make commercial airliners cleaner and greener will take 20 years to mature, NASA asked industry to look ahead at how air travel might look in 2030-35, to define what kinds of aircraft could be needed and identify the technologies that would be needed to make them a reality (see p. 40). Aviation Week & Space Technology has exclusive access to the findings, which will help NASA shape its aeronautics research. Cover shows a Boeing concept for a high-efficiency airliner with strut-braced wing and hybrid-electric propulsion.
The Finnish army is exploring upgrades to its nascent NH90 capability with an eye on providing enhanced support to the country’s fledgling special operations forces.
Chang Cheow Teck has been named president of Singapore Technologies Aerospace Ltd. He was president of Singapore Technologies Marine Ltd. and succeeds Tay Kok Khiang, who has retired. Following Chang is Ng Sing Chan, who was deputy president of ST Engineering and president of ST Marine’s defense business.
U.S. space policy remains the object of heated debate as the federal funding cycle grinds on, but powerful members of Congress are softening their outright opposition to the plan advanced by the White House in the Fiscal 2011 NASA budget request.
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The Golden Eagle—an F-15C fitted with an active, electronically scanned array (AESA) radar—is slated to lead strike packages because of its greater fuel capacity, which will give it “persistence” in the combat area (AW&ST April 26, p. 45). Just how this will enhance the low-observability (LO) mission of the F-22 is a bit of a puzzle.
W. Paul Thayer, a former CEO of LTV Aerospace Corp., a World War II Navy fighter pilot and one-time deputy Defense secretary, died May 6. He was 90. Thayer followed flamboyant businessman James Ling as head of Fort Worth conglomerate LTV and guided it from near bankruptcy to profitability before being appointed deputy Defense secretary in 1983 by President Ronald Reagan. Thayer was subsequently charged with insider trading and convicted of obstruction of justice.
Commercial aircraft have the potential to become dramatically cleaner and quieter in the next 25 years, but manufacturers will have to decide how far they want to push technology, and airlines must decide how much they are willing to pay for efficiency.
Solaris Mobile says it has been granted 18-year licenses to operate hybrid S-band mobile satellite services (MSS) in France, Sweden and Germany. The licenses—which add to approvals previously granted by Finland, Italy, Luxembourg and Slovenia—will allow the SES Astra-Eutelsat joint venture to deploy voice, data, TV, radio and other broadband services to mobile devices in seven countries of the European Union. Solaris is trying out hybrid MSS in the Paris area.
The first new commercial airport in the U.S. in 15 years—Northwest Florida Beaches International (ECP)—is ready to begin operations. The facility, which is scheduled to open on May 23, will replace the Panama City-Bay County International Airport (PFN). The latter will serve general aviation for several more weeks, then will be decommissioned so the land can be redeveloped.
Hakan Buskhe has been appointed president/CEO of Saab , effective Nov. 1. He has been CEO of E.On Sweden and president of E.On Nordic. Buskhe will succeed Ake Svensson, who will become president of the Association of Swedish Engineering Companies on Sept. 1.
David Justin, who is CEO of GlobeCast America, is one of three new members of the board of directors of the New York-based World Teleport Association . The others are: Serge Van Herck, CEO of Newtec; and Mahendra Nath Vyas, director of Essel Shyam Communications.
Regarding David A. Fulghum’s “Enhancing Stealth” (AW&ST April 26, p. 45): The U.S. Air Force has spent billions of taxpayer dollars developing and procuring the F-22 so-called air dominance fighter on the pretext that non-stealthy legacy fighters cannot survive the opening stages of future conflicts against advanced air defense networks.
A Eurocontrol member-state meeting on May 6 failed to resolve whether to use and help fund a proposed tool that would ease the monitoring, reporting and verification burden for small operators subject to Europe’s Emissions Trading System (ETS), particularly within the business aviation community. Bizav executives say that without the tool, low-level emitters could end up incurring disproportionate reporting and verification costs (AW&ST May 3, p. 60).
Robert S. Gelbard has been named to the board of managers of AAR Global Solutions , Wood Dale, Ill. He is chairman of Washington Global Partners and a consultant to the Institute for Defense Analyses.
Assembly of the first wing panels and spar (above) for the 747-8 Intercontinental passenger aircraft has begun at Boeing’s Everett, Wash., factory, with an eye toward first flight and delivery to Lufthansa next year. The initial work involved loading wing panels and a 111-ft.-long wing spar to provide the wing’s internal support into assembly tools in the Everett factory’s 40-21 bay. When final assembly begins later this year, the wings will be lifted next door into the 40-22 bay.
Mitchell I. Quain has been appointed to the board of directors of the Miami-based Heico Corp. He is a managing director of ACI Capital and chairman of MagneTek Inc.
Completion of engine start tests has put Boeing on track to introduce the first 787 powered by General Electric GEnx-1B engines into its flight test program, probably late this month. Additional ground tests, including taxi tests, remain to be completed on ZA005 before it takes to the air. ZA006, the last airplane in the flight test series, also will be GEnx-powered. Boeing says both will be in service by the end of June.
Iran is likely outgrowing the level of ballistic missile technology it can secure from North Korea, though previous worst-case scenarios of the speed of development of an intercontinental system have proved unfounded. The London-based International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS) contends in its report “Iran’s Ballistic Missile Capabilities” that Tehran is unlikely to be able to field liquid-propellant-based ballistic missile “capable of targeting Western Europe before 2014 or 2015.” The report also places a notional Iranian ICBM at least a decade away.
Thomas M. Hanley has been appointed president/CEO of Houston-based ExpressJet Holdings Inc. He has been director of United Express, vice president of US Airways Express and president of Republic Airlines.
The FAA says it is studying options to remedy the loss of a GPS Wide Area Augmentation System (WAAS) transponder on board Galaxy 15. The FAA currently leases capacity at Galaxy 15’s former position, and at 107.3 deg. W. also provided by Intelsat. The agency says 16 airports, chiefly in northwestern Alaska, are affected by the failure, but will be able to perform localizer performance with vertical guidance approaches with GPS only, although there may be service interruptions.
