The FAA on Mar. 17 immediately adopted an airworthiness directive (AD) that requires installation of new software in the left, center and right autopilot flight director computers on Boeing 777-200/-200ER/-300/-300ER/ and 777F-series aircraft. Software installation will be required within 90 days after the directive’s Apr. 1 effective date. The AD is aimed at preventing the inadvertent engagement of the autopilot during takeoff roll, which could result in rejected takeoff at rotation speed and increase the risk of a runway overrun.
You quote former shuttle astronaut Charlie Precourt, who is now vice president and general manager of ATK, as saying its reusable solid rocket motors “have proven themselves to be the safest and most reliable human-rated launch system” (AW&ST Mar. 1, p. 18).
Security officials from the Asia-Pacific region and the U.S. have forged a joint declaration to fight terrorism in all forms, particularly in civil aviation. The declaration was signed in Tokyo, during the visit of U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano there as part of the department’s continuing effort to enhance security standards worldwide following the Dec. 25, 2009, attempted bombing of a Northwest Airlines flight on approach to Detroit. The U.S. has already forged agreements with Brazil, Mexico and the European Union, among others.
As the cargo market starts to recover from an historic economic downturn, operators are confronted with a growing list of equipment options with which to optimize networks.
New Delhi and Moscow are moving forward on the procurement of a new aircraft carrier and additional carrier-based fighters following the visit to India of a top-level Russian delegation. However, the delegation could not lock in agreement on other key defense projects.
European and Russian planners for the upcoming Phobos-Grunt (Phobos Soil) sample-return mission to the tiny Martian moon have some new high-resolution imagery of possible landing sites. The European Space Agency’s Mars Express orbiter is using its unique orbit around the Red Planet to capture imagery of the proposed sites, including this one from March 7. Because of the orbiter’s unusually close passes to Phobos (AW&ST March 8, p. 16), the resolution here is 4.4 meters (14.4 ft.) per pixel. Phobos, a potato-shaped object measuring 27-by-22-by-19 km.
Boeing is poised to follow Airbus’s lead in reversing production curtailments made last year, signaling increased confidence in the strength of demand in 2011 and beyond.
The Wings Club, which is dedicated to preserving the history and traditions of aviation, will honor the Tuskegee Airmen at a ceremony in New York this week. Patt Terrelongue, president of the Claude B. Govan Tristate Chapter of the Tuskegee Airmen, and six select decorated members of the Tuskegee Airmen in attendance, will receive the Outstanding Aviator Award created this year by the club in association with the International Association of Women in Aviation.
Potential providers of commercial crew transportation to the ISS believe they can begin test flights three years after getting a green light from government. Space Exploration Technologies (SpaceX) has long touted that timetable for its unflown Falcon 9/Dragon stack, arguing that it is designing the vehicles from the outset to meet NASA human-spaceflight standards.
Away from the funding furor in Washington over the F136 alternate engine for the Joint Strike Fighter, the General Electric/Rolls-Royce development team is pushing ahead with full performance tests after running the production-configuration engine in maximum afterburner for the first time.
EADS and Norsk Titanium Components (NTiC) will cooperate on development of near net-shape plasma-based layer manufacturing technologies for aerospace, defense and space applications. The agreement was signed in Oslo this month. NTiC-developed technology enables production of high-quality titanium components at a competitive cost by transforming titanium feedstock into advanced components which are up to 90% finished.
A year ago, the commercial aviation engine community was unsure whether Airbus or Boeing would commit to selecting replacement engines for the A320 and 737 families before 2011-12. Then the date was pushed forward to sometime this year. The industry was looking for first announcements at July’s Farnborough air show. Now it looks like Airbus will act in April.
Lockheed Martin received a U.S. Navy sole-source indefinite-delivery-indefinite-quantity contract for Symphony radio-controlled improvised explosive device defeat jammer systems. The contract, with an initial task order valued at $40.8 million, is to run through September 2014 and lists a potential value of $940 million. The systems are approved for sale through the Foreign Military Sales program to allied, coalition and partner nations for operations in Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere.
Aerojet engineers will begin testing their version of the Soviet-era NK-33 oxygen/kerosene rocket engine as early as April at Stennis Space Center, Miss., following hot-fire tests of the Russian hardware here earlier this month.
European political leaders continue their verbal assault about U.S. protectionism in response to the decision by Northrop Grumman/EADS not to bid on the KC-X tanker. “This is no way to act,” sniffed French President Nicolas Sarkozy. EADS, however, is not lobbing rhetorical hand grenades but is trying to see if the prospects of Boeing as a sole source will prompt the Pentagon to shift gears. “Are they ready to change elements to help competition or not?” EADS chief Louis Gallois wondered aloud. Message received, the Pentagon indicated late last week.
Unmanned aircraft are poised to expand into a new market following the completion of cargo resupply demonstrations for the U.S. Marine Corps by Boeing with the A160T Hummingbird and Lockheed Martin and Kaman Aerospace with the K-Max. The unmanned helicopters demonstrated the ability to resupply a forward base, to meet the pressing need to get convoys off dangerous roads in Afghanistan. The teams are now awaiting a request for proposals to deploy the UAVs operationally, perhaps by year-end.
GE Capital Aviation Services (Gecas) is best known as one of the two biggest airplane leasing companies. But it also operates an airframe dismantling operation in Greenwood, Miss., and has become the latest member of the Aircraft Fleet Recycling Association to achieve accreditation in AFRA’s Best Management Practices program. The best practices effort is independently audited, covers a three-year program and costs $8,000 to complete, says Deputy Executive Director Bill Carberry, who wears another hat as head of Boeing’s environmental performance efforts.
The European Aviation Safety Agency has granted EADS the supplemental type certification (STC) for its work in converting Airbus A330 aircraft into multirole tanker transports. The document comes on the back of 60 flight-test hours that were needed for the STC and 170 flight-test hours overall performed for the lead customer, the Royal Australian Air Force. The STC covers the aerial refueling boom, refueling pods, operating console in the cockpit and other military features. Airbus also has adjusted flight controls to ease handling during refueling.
Hypersonic proponents worldwide will eagerly watch two long-awaited technology demonstrations starting with the imminent first flight attempt for the X-51 Waverider, to be followed within a month by the first flight of the Falcon HTV-2 hypersonic test vehicle.
Cosmonaut Oleg Kotov, commander of Expedition 23 on the International Space Station, and his crewmates Soichi Noguchi of Japan and T.J. Creamer of the U.S. will have a little extra space on the orbiting facility this week. Expedition 22 Commander Jeff Williams and flight engineer Maxim Suraev safely touched down in Soyuz TMA-16 on the snow-covered steppe near Arkalyk, Kazakhstan, Mar. 19, wrapping up a 167-day stay in orbit and leaving their sleeping quarters empty until the rest of Expedition 23 arrives next month.
Amy Butler (Washington), Robert Wall (Washington), Graham Warwick (Washington), Alon Ben-David (Tel Aviv)
The F-35B is taking a major step forward with verticallanding test milestones, though the massive price increase for the stealthy, single-engine fighter is raising eyebrows among international customers. The first vertical landing took place Mar. 18 after a 1:09 p.m. EDT takeoff at NAS Patuxent River, Md. BF-1, the first short-takeoff-and-vertical-landing (Stovl) model, rode more than 41,000 lb. of thrust to achieve this milestone, which is key in proving the aircraft’s suitability for the Marine Corps, U.K. and Italian forces.
On a recent visit to New York, Boeing CEO James McNerney told high-end investors that an uptick in air cargo traffic has “surprised” his company’s economists and augured well for sustained growth. Not long afterward, the International Air Transport Association (IATA) announced that cargo traffic in December 2009 was up 28% from the same period a year earlier.
When Woody Allen said 80% of success is showing up, he could have been referring to Northrop Grumman’s Fire Scout. Despite the U.S. Army’s recent decision to eliminate the vertical-takeoff unmanned aerial vehicle (VTUAV) from its Brigade Combat Team Modernization (BCTM) program, Northrop Grumman continues to fly and test Fire Scout for and with the service.
An abundance of used aircraft for sale and a continuing trickle of order cancellations are driving expectations that business aircraft orders will not see a marked recovery for some time, although several manufacturers expect financial performance to at least bottom out, or even start improving.
Airports Council International says the peak of the 2009 traffic crisis passed in the first quarter, with passenger demand down 8% and cargo off 20%. Steady improvement allowed the world’s airlines to end the year with global passenger traffic down 2.7% and cargo off 5.5%, according to data from 900 airports. Strong performance in Asia-Pacific and Latin America-Caribbean during the second half led the rebound. North American and European airports showed they “only timidly exited negative growth territory toward the end of the year.”
