I am baffled by Bombardier’s emphasis on the CSeries and lack of interest in a replacement for the 50-seat jet. There are many markets for which a 90-120-seat and larger jet is an inappropriate size. Do the major airlines think they will abandon those 50-seat markets and assume people will drive 100 mi. to fly out of a bigger airport? Do they think no entrepreneur will see this hole in the market and exploit it with a new design that produces an aircraft with 15-20% better economics than current 50-seaters?
U.S. private-equity firm Kohlberg Kravis & Roberts is to acquire 49.9% of Grupo Inaer in a deal that values the Spanish helicopter operator at $700 million. European investment companny Investindustrial will retain 50.1% of Inaer, which operates more than 280 helicopters and provides medical transport, firefighting, search and rescue, civil protection and customs surveillance services for governments and regional authorities. Headquartered in Alicante, Inaer has more than 240 bases in Spain, Italy, France, Portugal, the U.K. and Chile.
The Viewpoint, “Killing Ares Will Kill the Dream,” is a full-page advertisement for ATK (AW&ST April 19, p. 66). Ares is a rocket designed by politicians, not engineers. In the same issue, the U.S. Air Force X-37B is shown being prepared for an orbital launch test. This former NASA project proves we have viable options to “Apollo on steroids” and that visionaries in the Air Force have moved beyond capsules and parachutes.
Mark Carreau (Johnson Space Center), Frank Morring, Jr. (Washington)
The resurrection of NASA’s Orion crew exploration vehicle as a space station lifeboat is injecting a new disruption into the agency’s already challenging transition from the in-house human-spaceflight plan it started under former President George W. Bush to President Barack Obama’s commercial space transportation and technology-investment agenda.
Simon Pryce took the helm of BBA Aviation just as the global economyexperienced a severe downturn. The aviation support and aftermarket service provider that owns marquee names, such as Signature and ASIG, has not escaped the ripple effects, although an aggressive cost-cutting effort has helped BBA to weather the turmoil. Pryce tells International Editor Robert Wall that the efforts have left BBA better structured to benefit financially from the rebound, whatever its pace may be.
The Show Goes On In Geneva Having weathered a global recession, plunging aircraft valuations, a credit crisis, decreased operations and, more recently, an angry Icelandic volcano, the embattled business aviation community gathers in Geneva May 4-6 for the 10th edition of the European Business Aviation Convention & Exhibition (Ebace).
EADS Defense and Security Div. will for the first time install its Helicopter Laser Radar (Hellas) subsystem on a Sikorsky S-92 helicopter. Hellas is aimed at helping crew to detect and avoid such obstacles as power lines from a distance of up to 1,000 meters (3,280 ft.). The new effort is part of a contract with the Royal Thai Air Force. The service has already purchased three Hellas systems for its Bell 412 fleet. An additional three are now being acquired for the S-92.
Japan Airlines will retire all its Boeing 747-400s and Airbus A300-600s by the end of March 2011, under an accelerated restructuring plan aimed at achieving cost cuts that it previously hoped to achieve over three years. As a result of the cuts, the airline will offer 40% less capacity internationally and 30% less domestically than it did in the year ended March 2009. Fifteen international and 30 domestic routes will be dropped. Adding those services to ones cut during the last fiscal year, the total reductions will be 28 and 50 routes, respectively.
Italian defense and aerospace conglomerate Finmeccanica saw revenues grow for the first quarter of 2010, though net profit was down versus the same period for 2009. R&D investment was also down slightly. Revenue for the period was €4 billion ($5.3 billion), a 3% increase over the first quarter of 2009. Net profit fell by 15% to €91 million from €108 million. Order intake was also slightly down, but so was debt, which was cut by 2% to €4.3 billion.
The government of the Hebei province surrounding Beijing is making a bid to head off plans to build a second airport at the capital, saying it will upgrade its own nearby facility to take on the role. Hebei proposes building new airports at Qinhuangdao, Zhangjiakou and Chengde and expanding Handan under a program budgeted at 2 billion yuan ($293 million).
Tony Taliancich, who has been director of the United Launch Alliance ’s East Coast operations at Cape Canaveral AFS, Fla., has been named director of the Customer Program Office. He has been succeeded by Mark Dowhan, who was director of West Coast operations at Vandenberg AFB, Calif. Following Dowhan is Rick Beach, who was director of common upper stage and product evolution.
Military planners hope that Europe’s revised institutional framework—as outlined in the Lisbon Treaty—will help broaden the mandate of a key satellite center and the European Defense Agency (EDA) so they can contribute more meaningfully to continental defense.
With the 22nd Boeing 787 in final body join, the company has put the brakes on further large assembly deliveries to the aircraft’s integration plant in Everett, Wash., as its supply chain struggles with airframe—not systems—parts shortages.
Flight testing of an upgraded radar on the U.S. Air Force’s Rockwell-built B-1B bomber has begun at Dyess AFB, Texas. The Reliability and Maintainability Improvement Program (RMIP) replaces the receiver/transmitter and radar processor in the B-1’s APQ-164 radar with derivatives of units from Northrop Grumman’s APG-68(V)9 radar for the F-16. Software has been rewritten from Ada to C++ to improve supportability. Boeing was awarded a $180-million contract to upgrade 67 B-1s, with RMIP kits to be delivered beginning in 2011 and installation to be completed in 2014.
Kevin Moschetti has been promoted to president of the Bellevue, Wash.-based Esterline Corp. ’s Communication Systems from president of subsidiary Palomar Products.
Brian Barrett (see photos) has been promoted to vice president-aftermarket services for the Aerospace Group of Crane Aerospace & Electronics , Lynnwood, Wash., from director of repair and overhaul services. Eric Wilson has become the group’s Burbank, Calif.-based vice president-human resources. He held the same position at Crane Composites.
Tony Fernandes Age: 46 Education: Educated at Epsom College; graduated from the London School of Economics in 1987. Career: Became financial controller of Warner Music International in 1987; worked as an auditor at Virgin Atlantic and as the financial auditor for Virgin Records. Named managing director at Warner Music Malaysia in 1992. Became vice president of Warner Music-Southeast Asia in 1999 and left in 2001 to buy the ailing AirAsia.
India has proved once again that it cannot push the pedal too hard for speedy procurement of a major weapon system. It has been forced to notify vendors seeking the coveted 126 Medium Multi-Role Combat Aircraft (MMRCA) award that they will need to rebid, prompting a schedule delay that might drive up costs. The bidders represent the industry’s biggest fighter manufacturers—MiG Russian Aircraft Corp., Dassault, Eurofighter, Saab, Boeing and Lockheed Martin.
Officials at U.S. Special Operations Command have tested the integration of Boeing’s Small Diameter Bomb I, a 250-lb. GPS-guided weapon, against fixed targets on the wing of the new Dragon Spear variant of the Lockheed Martin C-130, according to a senior Socom official. Dragon Spear refers to an armament package designed for the MC-130W, which has the original mission of transporting elite troops behind enemy lines. Current armaments include a 30-mm. gun and the 35-50-lb. Special-Operations Precision-Guided Munition.
The FAA has proposed a $348,000 civil penalty against regional carrier Chautauqua Airlines for allegedly operating regional jets that had not undergone lower wing, engine and electrical inspections mandated by airworthiness directives. The FAA in its April 27 penalty notice blamed problems in management of the airline’s maintenance program and AD-compliance tracking system for the alleged violations. One directive, for example, required repetitive checks for cracks in the lower wing planks of Bombardier Canadair Regional Jets after every 5,000 flights.
USAF Col. (ret.) Paul Comtois has been appointed director of aircraft upset training and research of the Environmental Tectonics Corp. , Southampton, Pa., and its National Aerospace Training and Research Center. He was commander of the 111th Fighter Wing of the Pennsylvania Air National Guard at Willow Grove Air Reserve Station.
Fuel-burn, emissions and environmental issues are no longer the airlines’ and operator’s top priorities, according to findings from two recent customer surveys conducted by the General Electric-Snecma joint engine company CFM International. Despite uncertainty over fuel prices, operators now consider reliability as their top priority with fuel burn slipping back to fifth slot behind cost in second place, followed by quality and time-on-wing.
Aerojet and Florida Turbine Technologies will continue the work they have conducted together on the USAF Hydrocarbon Boost Technology Demonstrator and Upper Stage Engine Technology efforts in a teaming arrangement set up to seek new business at NASA. The partnership announced April 29 will compete with at least Pratt & Whitney Rocketdyne and Space Exploration Technologies Inc. in bidding to build a new liquid-oxygen/hydrocarbon rocket engine for the first stage of NASA’s proposed new heavy-lift launch vehicle.
Eurocopter is giving its improvement program, Shape, a boost in light of the evolving competitive nature of the helicopter market and the glimmer of light that some see in the dark economic cloud that has hovered over most of the world’s manufacturers for the last several years. More than €1.3 billion ($1.7 billion) will be invested in its self-funded research and development budget; this follows the doubling of its R&D allocation from 2007-10. The added monies will fund new helo programs and bolster enhanced global support and services.
