French national space agency CNES says the European Union has selected Paris and London to host the Galileo Security Monitoring Center (GSMC) that will be in charge of controlling access to Galileo’s encypted Public Regulated Signal. It will become available, along with the open and search-and-rescue signals, in mid-2014 . Paris will serve as the main facility and London the backup. France and the U.K.
OHB and Thales Alenia Space have reportedly been selected for a €1.5-billion contract to supply six spacecraft for Europe’s Meteosat Third Generation (MTG) geostationary weather forecasting satellite system. The win, over EADS Astrium, is provoking charges that ESA did not fully respect procedures in its selection process. Astrium also lost to OHB in the contest to supply the first batch of Galileo satellites. CNES Director General Yannick d’Escatha said France “has full confidence in ESA” but will call for an audit to clear up the matter.
Mark Carreau (Johnson Space Center), Frank Morring, Jr. (Washington)
Some 11,500 civil service and contractor personnel in a dozen U.S. states will potentially be affected by President Barack Obama’s decision to cancel the Constellation Program of human-exploration spacecraft started under his predecessor.
Hawker Beechcraft reported an operating loss of $712 million during 2009, attributable to the brutal downturn in the business aviation market and a large order cancellation from fractional operator NetJets. O verall sales were down 9% from 2008 to $3.2 billion . But the value of its order backlog shrank 55% to $3.4 billion from $7.6 billion. The bulk of that loss occurred during the fourth quarter, when Hawker confirmed NetJets’ cancellation . Hawker delivered 309 business and general aviation aircraft in 2009, down from 441 the previous year.
General Motors and NASA are developing an advanced dexterous robot that may sometimes work alongside human counterparts in space and on the factor floor. Chris Ihrke (above), a senior project engineer at the automaker, works with the robotic humanoid. Based on Robonaut, which was developed a decade ago at Johnson Space Center in collaboration with the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, Robonaut 2 (R2) has hands that are much faster and dexterous.
Ryanair has named Kaunas in Lithuania as its first base in Central Europe in its effort to tap new markets to sustain its growth strategy. The location, which is also the 40th base for Europe’s largest low-fare airline, will accommodate two Boeing 737-800s starting in May. Talks are underway for four other locations. Ryanair already operates to Kaunas, but its strategy includes increasing the network to 18 routes from nine.
Mark Dunkerley, CEO of Hawaiian Airlines’ parent company Hawaiian Holdings, says 2009 was a “remarkable year for our company.” Hawaiian Holdings posted its “best-ever” results, and the hard work of employees and lower fuel prices combined to overcome the effects of an economic recession as well as “the attentions of a new entrant on our interisland routes,” says Dunkerley. Among the highlights of its fourth-quarter and year-end financial results: In 2009, Hawaiian set a record by transporting 8.3 million passengers and ranked No.
Researchers plan to flight-test a one-third-scale version of an electric-powered, tail-sitting, vertical-takeoff-and-landing single-person aircraft called the Puffin.
Students at the University of Southern California are working with the U.S. military to demonstrate global cargo-container tracking from space for the Homeland Security Dept., using a triple-decker Cubesat. Under development at USC’s Information Sciences Institute—which is working with the USC Space Engineering Research Center in a “teaching hospital” approach for mentoring young engineers—the “Aeneas” satellite will consist of three 10-cm. cubes carrying new technology for Cubesats in radio frequency, computer and distributed operations.
Mark W. Kenny (see photo) has been appointed Washington-based vice president of Irregular Warfare Programs for the Northrop Grumman Corp. He was director of the U.S. Navy’s Office of Irregular Warfare. Edward J. Bush has become vice president of C4ISR Networked Systems for the company’s Baltimore-based Electronic Systems Sector. He was director of Sensor Exploitation Systems and Colorado Operations.
BAE Systems hopes its admissions of guilt and agreement to pay $447 million in fines will end corruption investigations on both sides of the Atlantic. The fines are the result of long-running investigations by the U.K.’s Serious Fraud Office and the U.S. Justice Dept. In the U.K., BAE Systems agreed to “ plead guilty to one charge of breach of duty to keep accounting records in relation to payments made to a former marketing adviser in Tanzania,” concerning the SFO investigation. It will pay £30 million ($47 million) .
Japan’s expanding Skynet Asia Airways placed an order last week to lease a Boeing 737-800 from Dubin-based aircraft lessor AWAS. The aircraft is to be put into service this summer and marks the start of the airline’s fleet renewal effort. The planned turnover of the carrier’s fleet to 737NGs from nine 737-400s plus the opening of a fourth runway at Tokyo’s Haneda Airport later this year, represent a firm foundation for growth, according to airline CEO Masataka Ito.
The death of Rep. John P. (Jack) Murtha (D-Pa.) leaves a sudden vacuum in one of the most powerful aerospace/defense positions on Capitol Hill that could have a long-lasting impact on the industry, depending on how it is filled.
Regarding the article “Technology vs. Terrorism” (AW&ST Jan. 4, p. 24), bear in mind the comments of then-opposition leader Stanley Balwain when he shocked the U.K. in 1932 by saying: “I think it is well also for the man in the street to realize that there is no power on Earth that can protect him from being bombed. . . . The bomber will always get through . . .” He was, of course, referring to fleets of aerial bombers in a war between nations. However, his words can easily be applied to terrorism. The U.S.
Russia has begun flying a stealthy fifth-generation fighter to rival the U.S. F-22, but Western analysts question whether Sukhoi can develop and deliver the aircraft by 2015 as promised. Sukhoi’s T-50, which made its 47-min. first flight on Jan. 29 from the KnAAPO facility in Komsomolsk-on-Amur, is the prototype of the PAK FA “future front-line aircraft,” the first new-generation fighter for the Russian air force since the Su-27 Flanker entered service in 1984. India plans to co-fund development and co-produce the new aircraft.
Tim Brady’s characterization of flight instruction as “repeating the same hour 1,000 times” (AW&ST Nov. 30, 2009, p. 54) ignores the reality of such instruction in a dangerous way, inverting the established priorities of aviate-navigate-communicate.
The Airbus A400M customer nations and parent company EADS are closer to an agreement over pricing of the military transport, but an actual deal was still not reached last week after several rounds of negotiations . Industry sources sa y talks are likely to continue for at least several days .
The Spanish interior ministry has agreed to acquire 12 Eurocopter EC135 P2i light-twin helicopters for law-enforcement and search-and-rescue missions. Six will be operated by the Guardia Civil and six by the National Police, which already fly 14 EC135s between them. Deliveries are planned for 2010-12.
Bolstered by a growing demand for design work on the A350, A330F and other models, Airbus North America Engineering (ANAE) is set to add 80 engineering jobs at its Wichita, Kan., site and is ahead of schedule with expansion plans at its Mobile, Ala., facility. In addition, Airbus says the new hires will “allow us to do repair engineering as well—the first time we’ve had that ability in the U.S. In Mobile, it’s primarily cabin and stress engineering.
The FAA’s Fiscal 2011 budget request sends the strongest signal yet that the Obama administration is dropping plans to introduce aviation user fees, at least for now. Aviation policymakers and industry groups were watching carefully for any user-fee language, so its omission was a major talking point. Even though turning to user fees could have relieved some pressure on the federal budget, it appears that the administration decided this was one battle it did not want to fight.
The U.S. Homeland Security Dept. budget includes funding for 1,000 advanced imaging machines country’s airports, but the airline industry, represented by the Air Transport Assn. (ATA), is objecting to security fees that would fund this program.
European missile manufacturer MBDA is adding a member to its Simbad naval short-range air defense system, the Simbad-RC remote weapons station. The system uses the Mistral 2 missile to provide close-in air defense, with single- and twin-turret configurations as the baseline. Simbad was developed to address close-in air defense requirements for fast patrol boats and support ships. The operator is remotely located within the ship, and can control one or two launchers. The basic Simbad can be upgraded to the Simbad-RC standard.
The Visible Infrared Imager Radiometer Suite (VIRS) is readied for installation in the Npoess Preparatory Project (NPP) weather satellite at Ball Aerospace’s Boulder, Colo., facility. But the spacecraft will have a new name as a result of a White House directive. The Office of Science and Technology Policy decided to dismantle the joint Defense and Commerce Dept. National Polar-Orbiting Operational Environmental Satellite System, or Npoess, and allow the two departments to embark on separate programs to meet their unique needs.
Some savings from reduced overhead and streamlined facilities are being realized from the establishment of the United Launch Alliance, a Lockheed Martin/Boeing joint venture formed in 2006 to oversee their Atlas V and Delta IV launch vehicles. But the White House’s proposed cancellation of NASA’s Constellation P rogram is not going to help, says Gary Payton, deputy undersecretary of the Air Force for space. Each of Constellation’s Ares V launchers would require six RS-68 liquid-fueled engines, which are also used on the Delta IV.
