Inspections of the U.K.’s Merlin and Apache helicopter engines are being stepped up following an incident which resulted in damage to two powerplants while they were being run on the ground. The AgustaWestland Merlin antisubmarine-warfare and support helicopter and WAH-64 attack helicopter use the Rolls-Royce Turbomecca RTM322 turboshaft engine. A Merlin recently suffered a failure on one of its three RTM322s during a ground run. This culminated in the loss of a compressor blade, which caused damage to a second engine. Periodic engine inspections have begun .
NASA’s Mars Science Laboratory (MSL) has successfully completed a set of rigorous actuator tests, which agency managers hope is a sign that the problem-plagued rover mission has turned a corner. “The final actuator that we were having problems with has passed its two-times life test,” NASA science chief Ed Weiler says. MSL’s actuators will drive the rover’s wheels and its robotic arm. The two-times life tests run the actuators continuously for twice their design life. MSL is targeting a September 2011 launch, after missing its original 2009 Mars launch opportunity.
Lockheed Martin workers at NASA’s Michoud Assembly Facility expect to finish the last of 134 space shuttle external tanks by the end of June before shutting down the production line for the huge aluminum-lithium structures. They have already resettled the tank—designated ET-138—back in the horizontal position (see photo) after hoisting it upright to splice the liquid oxygen/intertank section to the 96.7-ft. liquid oxygen tank that rides at the bottom of the tank portion of the shuttle stack. The LOX tank that forms the nose of the external tank is 54.6 ft.
Directed-energy weapons are to take a major step forward with creation of the first test facility enabling open-air firings of high-power solid-state lasers against rockets, mortars, unmanned aircraft and other targets.
Frustrated with the pace at which its Eurofighter Typhoon fleet has been coming into service, the German air force is restructuring operations for the short term to boost the number of available crewmembers.
Mar. 18—Royal Aeronautical Society Washington Branch’s Annual Meeting and Presentation: James E. Bennett, president and CEO, Metropolitan Washington Airports Authority. British Embassy. Call +1 (703) 693-1564 or e-mail: [email protected] Mar. 21-24—Institute of Applied Aviation Management/National Academy of Legal Studies and Research University of Law’s Post-Graduate Diploma Seminar: “Aviation Law and Air Transport Management.” Sharjah International Airport, United Arab Emirates. Call +91 (94) 4787-5164 or see www.nalsar.ac.in
Top aerospace and defense (A&D) executives are moving to reposition their businesses for an era of leaner Pentagon spending and preserve core capabilities as aging baby boomers retire. But they face formidable hurdles in getting their organizations to execute on the new business strategies, according to a new industry report.
Two members of the US Airways Flight 1549 “Miracle on the Hudson” crew retired from the airline last week. The flight’s captain, Chesley (Sully) Sullenberger, 3rd, who guided the Airbus A320 to a safe emergency landing on the Hudson River on Jan. 15, 2009—and without loss of life to the 155 people on board—joined the airline in 1980. Doreen Welsh, one of the attendants on the flight, leaves US Airways after 39 years.
:This ice-covered tower in Saglek, Newfoundland, is one of the ground units Nav Canada is installing on the country’s northeast coast to bring satellite surveillance to transatlantic air routes. Canada’s ATC provider is one of the leaders in deploying Automatic Dependent Surveillance-Broadcast, a technology that is viewed by many as the successor to radar (see p. 42). Nav Canada photo.
A French move to sell four Mistral helicopter carriers to Russia could help generate a reappraisal of Moscow’s security relationship with Western capitals, and open up East-West arms trade. During Russian President Dimitri Medvedev’s visit here last week, French President Nicolas Sarkozy announced that he had approved the opening of negotiations for four of the multirole assault ships. The talks will supersede earlier discussions, begun last summer, for the purchase of a single vessel.
Should the U.S. government require standard cybersecurity criteria for all of its contractors as a condition of receiving federal awards? Should contractors, regardless of size, be favored in competitions if they pay their workers better than others? These and other issues are occupying rulemakers and lawmakers alike as they work through the aftershocks of last year’s acquisition reform earthquake in Washington. Rulemakers have called for a public meeting Apr. 22 at NASA headquarters to elicit comment on proposed information assurance standards for federal projects.
France and Britain have agreed to cooperate in buying hardware to meet urgent operational requirements (UORs). The pact , concluded on Feb. 18, will provide a common framework for five types of UOR acquisition, including joint purchases, nation-to-nation arms sales and modification of existing contracts to cover partner requirements (AW&ST Nov. 30, 2009, p. 62). Up for renewal every five years, the accord is the latest example of the increasingly close defense ties between Paris and London.
Lockheed Martin CEO Robert Stevens is taking personal responsibility for the company’s poor performance on the multinational Joint Strike Fighter (JSF) program and he says he plans to keep top program executive Dan Crowley in place. “I am the accountable executive in Lockheed Martin, and I am certainly accountable in the performance of this program. I, more than any other person, influence the climate here under which this kind of work can be done,” Stevens told reporters during a joint teleconference last week with Pentagon acquisition chief Ashton Carter.
The business of air navigation service providers is changing, and with it, so must the business of its trade association. That’s a conclusion that has become very clear to me since I became director general of the Civil Air Navigation Services Organization (Canso).
NASA science chief Ed Weiler says that although he may not live to see it himself, he would be “shocked” if humanity fails to discover extraterrestrial life before the close of this century. He says it might be in our Solar System under the Martian soil or the frozen crust of Jupiter’s moon Europa. Or it might be seen through telescopes observing the by-products of life in the atmospheres of distant extrasolar planets.
We occasionally hoist ourselves with our own training petards. As Capt. Brian Wilson points out (AW&ST Feb. 22, p. 8), NASA-advocated training in how to recover from a tailplane stall requires the opposite primary flight control input from that for a “normal” stall. Our company flies turboprops and watches the NASA tailplane stall video, too.
The aircraft leasing market is seeing an upsurge in business , but a cloud hovers above the sector as several lessors ponder their next moves and Airbus and Boeing product decisions remain in flux. What’s more, there is no consensus on how pronounced the rebound is. “I believe we are well into the recovery,” says AerCap CEO Klaus Heinemann, adding: “There has been a sustained and, in some cases, a substantial rebound among our emerging market clients in Asia and Latin America in particular.”
NASA and the Italian Space Agency (ASI) have picked the multi-purpose logistics module Leonardo as the pressurized cargo container that will be left at the International Space Station as an extra space for experiments and storage. Built for ASI by Thales Alenia Space, Leonardo and its brother modules, Raffaello and Donatello, can carry about 10 tons of supplies inside their 21 X 15-ft. pressurized volume. Designed to be orbited by NASA’s space shuttle, they will be obsolete when the shuttle fleet is retired after four more flights.
The House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee on Mar. 3 approved an NTSB reauthorization bill that would provide the safety board with increasing funding over a four-year period and the addition of 66 employees, to bring the total staff to 477. The bill would provide NTSB’s requested funding levels: $117.4 million in Fiscal 2011, $120.3 million in Fiscal 2012, $122.2 million in Fiscal 2013 and $124.2 million in Fiscal 2014.
Airport groups have asked the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) for major revisions of proposed regulations for controlling runoff of aircraft deicing fluids, contending the rules as written are inflexible and would cripple airports with high costs.
Closing New York JFK International Airport’s Runway 31Left/13Right through June for repaving and widening will create traffic conditions similar to summertime peaks, according to the FAA. Domestic airlines, including JFK’s largest, JetBlue, have reduced flights by 10% to help ease the traffic burden. The 14,500-ft. runway, also called the Bay Runway, handles one-third of JFK operations, according to the airport’s operator, the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey.
The International Space Station, almost complete in orbit after a decade of assembly, is the recipient of the 2009 Robert J. Collier Trophy. The National Aeronautic Assn. announced the award “for the design, development and assembly of the world’s largest spacecraft, an orbiting laboratory that promises new discoveries for mankind and sets new standards for international cooperation in space.” Recipients are NASA, the U.S.
While your editorial on what you characterize as misguided Asian airline bailouts (AW&ST Feb. 15, p. 58) makes several valid points, it is difficult for a reader outside the U.S. not to succumb to a wry smile. Has the writer forgotten the billions of dollars in federal largesse handed out to U.S. carriers after 9/11, to the disadvantage of less-fortunate competitors?
Radical aerodynamic and structural design technologies offering potential fuel-saving and noise-reduction breakthroughs will be tested in back-to-back experiments by NASA in partnership with the U.S. Air Force.
