EADS CASA has delivered the first of three C-295 tactical transports to the Chilean navy for maritime patrol. The Finnish government is adding another C-295M, augmenting two of the tactical transports delivered in 2007-08. The additional aircraft is to be delivered in 2013.
Data from the first test of the pad-abort system for NASA’s Orion crew exploration vehicle should help make U.S. astronauts safer, regardless of which vehicle they ride to orbit after the space shuttle fleet retires (see p. 43). The May 6 test at White Sands Missile Range, N.M., validated the integrated performance of the Alliant Techsystems abort and attitude-control motors, the Aerojet jettison motor and the Honeywell avionics that delivered onboard sequencing and inertial navigation for the solid-fuel system.
If Europe finally manages to effectively streamline its air traffic management system after years of trying, the credit will likely go to the Eyjafjallajokull volcano for spotlighting the high cost of the fractured arrangement now in place.
Flight trials are underway for an upgrade to the Rafale’s turbojets aimed at curing reliability problems. The enhanced M88—the M88-4E—has completed 10 flight trials and should enter service in late 2011. The initial 90-min. flight test (one of 70 planned) took place at the Istres air base in the south of France on March 22.
May 16-19—American Association of Airport Executives’ 82nd Annual Conference and Exposition: “Longitude, Latitude & Lone Stars.” Hilton Anatole, Dallas. Call +1 (703) 824-0504 or see www.aaae.org/meetings/ May 17-19—American Astronautical Society’s Kyle T. Alfriend Astrodynamics Symposium. Monterey (Calif.) Hotel & Spa. Call +1 (703) 866-0020 or see www.astronautical.org May 24-27—Naval Helicopter Association’s 2010 Symposium. Hyatt Regency Jacksonville (Fla.) Riverfront. See www.navalhelicopterassn.org/symposium-2010
Rockwell Collins CEO Clay Jones, on a trip to Washington for business meetings, says he has learned his lesson since the early days of Boeing’s 787 development, when he enthusiastically proclaimed that the program appeared to be on track. Jones, whose company is a major systems supplier on the 787, declines to speculate on whether Boeing will meet its new fourth-quarter deadline for first delivery. The original date was May 2008. “There are things I can control and there are other things that I have to pray about,” he tells Aviation Week editors.
WheelTug, an electrically powered nose gear meant to cut fuel consumption during taxi, has overcome a key concern—that the launch aircraft would not generate enough power to drive the in-wheel motor. Results from electrical load measurement tests on a Delta Air Lines’ Boeing 737NG at Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport in January have allayed those fears. Other engineering issues, including packaging the new wheel and motor to fit within the existing nose-wheel envelope for easy retrofit, have also been resolved, says CEO Isaiah Cox.
Winglet Technology has received European Aviation Safety Agency approval to install its elliptical winglets on the Cessna Citation X. The company earlier won OKs in the U.S., Canada and Brazil. With four passengers and NBAA IFR reserves, range increases to 3,323 nm. from 3,103 nm. Time to climb to FL430 is reduced to 37 from 137 min. (MTOW, ISA +10) and time to FL450 is reduced to 37 from 84 min. Cessna supported the supplemental type certificate (STC) process for the winglets.
Carl Ehrlich’s letter on the commercial crew launch vehicle development program at the Sierra Nevada Corp. is another effort to justify government funding of its Dream Chaser project (AW&ST April 12, p. 8; Feb. 22, p. 53). NASA has awarded Sierra Nevada $20 million in its Commercial Orbital Transportation System competition.
The business case for reengining Airbus A320s and Boeing 737s may be weaker than first expected, analysts believe after viewing data from Boeing Capital Corp. Information that Boeing’s financing arm is providing in a series of briefings led analysts for Wells Fargo Securities to conclude that “we are less certain that a mid-year reengined A320 announcement by Airbus is a given, and if Airbus does not go forward, we think it is even less likely that Boeing will.
Embraer President/CEO Frederico Fleury Curado spoke with AW&ST Editor-in-Chief Anthony L. Velocci, Jr., and Senior Business Editor Joseph C. Anselmo at the company’s headquarters in Sao Jose dos Campos, Brazil. AW&ST: You are facing a future marked by more competition: China, Japan, a resurgent Bombardier. How is this prospect influencing Embraer’s strategic planning?
NASA Chief of Staff George T. Whitesides, one of the architects of the turnabout space policy embodied in the agency’s Fiscal 2011 budget request, is leaving the agency for a post in the private sector as of May 11. David P. Radzanowski, deputy associate administrator for program integration in the Space Operations Mission Directorate, will succeed Whitesides.
Bell Helicopter President and CEO John Garrison is confident his company will hit its sales target of 150 commercial helicopters this year, just three fewer than in 2009. With 15 commercial deliveries in the first quarter and Bell 429 production expected to reach only 25 aircraft this year, he says the rest of the sales will come from Model 206s, 407s and 412s.
A long-running Pentagon quandary—over who conducts airborne electronic warfare, how offensive electronic-attack capabilities should be strengthened and when or what permission is needed to launch tactical cyber-attacks—now has a venue for resolution.
Russian engineers are checking out the status of the KURS autonomous docking system on the International Space Station, after Expedition 23 Commander Oleg Kotov was forced to take manual control of the approaching Progress 37 cargo carrier on May 1 when the KURS failed. Control of the supply spacecraft automatically shifted to the manual TORU system. Kotov, a Soyuz pilot trained to operate TORU as a backup in just such a situation, used controls in the Zvezda service module to guide the Progress to the port on the Pirs docking compartment.
The first two of six Wedgetail Boeing 737 Airborne Early Warning and Control aircraft have been accepted by the Royal Australian Air Force at its Williamtown base in New South Wales. Acceptance means all maintenance, ground and flight operations are under RAAF control. Boeing is scheduled to deliver three more of the aircraft, based on a 737-700 airframe, by year-end, including one upgraded to the final AEW&C configuration with electronic support measures. The rest will be upgraded in early 2011.
Astronomers will compete for early places on NASA’s Stratospheric Observatory for Infrared Astronomy (Sofia) airborne observatory as the start of science missions nears, following completion of envelope expansion flights with the telescope cavity door open.
The Dutch accident investigation report into the Feb. 25, 2009, crash of a Turkish Airlines Boeing 737-800 (TK1951) on approach to Amsterdam Schiphol Airport has reaffirmed the initial conclusion that an altimeter fault led to the engine autothrottle reducing power to idle, from which crews were unable to recover. In releasing the report into the crash that killed five passengers and four crewmembers when the 737 landed 1.5 km.
Proposals are being sought for construction of a plant to produce 787 parts for interior modules to support Boeing’s North Charleston, S.C., factory when it opens in 2011. This new site, which ideally will be adjacent to the North Charleston factory, is an outgrowth of the decision last December to seek second sources for the 787 vertical stabilizer and other assemblies made by its Fabrication Div. at plants in the Puget Sound area around Seattle. Boeing wants to be able to blunt the effects of possible labor strikes. The Fabrication Div.
United Airlines’ confidence that it will regain the title of world’s largest airline after merging with Continental Airlines ignores a potentially damaging regulatory review by a contrarian U.S. Justice Department as well as some skepticism about the true value of the arrangement.
Numerous indicators suggest the executive aviation sector has begun emerging from a recession notable for its depth and suddenness, but the climb out is likely to be neither universal nor steady. And there’s a consensus that it will not be swift.
Bombardier has opened a business aircraft service center at Amsterdam’s Schiphol Airport to service the 550-plus Learjets, Challengers and Global Expresses in Europe and the former Soviet states. The Montreal-based manufacturer expects that number to grow by another 200 in the next few years.
As NASA debates whether to send the space shuttle Atlantis on a final mission to the International Space Station (ISS), here is a simple and safe solution: Send Atlantis with a two-person crew, leave it docked to ISS and have the crew catch a ride back to Earth on a Soyuz (AW&ST April 26, p. 16).
